'Myth' becomes reality for Wimberley's Smith

In May 2004, at the wide-eyed age of 15, Sahara Smith stepped onto the hallowed stage of the Fitzgerald Theater in St. Paul, Minn., guitar in hand. Before her waited an audience of 1,000. Beyond the walls of the Fitzgerald, even more were listening — nearly four million across 500 radio stations from coast to coast.

Months before, Smith's father, Russell, persuaded her to submit a demo tape to National Public Radio variety show "A Prairie Home Companion." The program, anchored by the warmly authorial Garrison Keillor, was holding a contest, "Talent from Twelve to Twenty," to spotlight young musicians.

"I submitted it on a whim to placate him, because he was so excited about the idea of it," Smith says. "But I sent in the tape thinking nothing was going to happen."

Keillor loved the tape, and "A Prairie Home Companion" flew Smith and her father out to St. Paul to compete against seven other youthful players. Smith was excited. She was anxious. Truthfully, she was terrified.

"The moment before she went on stage, knowing there were going to be so many people, she seemed like a deer in the headlights," Russell Smith says. "She was so nervous. It seemed like she was having a panic attack. And I said, 'Honey you're going to do great.'"

The turning point came backstage, as Smith glanced Keillor, bathed in the orange glow of the studio lights, standing just out of view of the audience, calmly contemplating his words before beginning the show. Following his example, she pulled herself together.

"I'd been listening to Garrison Keillor since I was really tiny," Smith says. "My parents would put on his monologues as a way to make me go to sleep. That's how soothing his voice and personality were."

Listen to that episode of "A Prairie Home Companion" (available at prairiehome.publicradio.org) and you can hear the hesitance in Smith's voice. As Keillor banters, she sounds slightly uneasy.

"The Blanco River they call it?" Keillor inquires of the river flowing through Smith's hometown of Wimberley. "How white is the Blanco? Are there chemical plants along the river? Is it foaming?"

Smith laughs tentatively.

But every last ounce of anxiety seems to melt away the moment she plucks her first string and sings her first note, as she launches into a sad, lilting folk song. Still, even as audience votes were tabulated, Smith was convinced she had played her only song that evening.

"I was so sure that I wasn't going to get called back that I actually put my guitar away," Smith says. "I was so certain I had messed it up. So I went backstage and packed it in. And they called me back, and right before I went back out I had to start tuning it again."

When Smith returned for the finals, she exchanged quips with Keillor as she tuned her guitar before launching into a haunting original song. Smith's mother, Suzanna Chesshire, got goosebumps as she listened in, 1,200 miles to the south.

"I was shaking. It was very exciting," says Chesshire. "She stepped out in front of an audience of 1,000 people and prior to that she had only performed at a restaurant in Wimberley. It was an amazing moment."

Smith nabbed second place that evening, and her future as an Austin singer-songwriter to watch was assured. She releases her debut album, the richly evocative "Myth of the Heart," today. The project was shaped under producer extraordinaire T-Bone Burnett — the musician with a seemingly infinite résumé that includes Los Lobos, Elvis Costello, Roy Orbison, a staggering number of soundtracks, including this year's Oscar-winning "Crazy Heart," and Robert Plant and Allison Krauss' Grammy-winning "Raising Sand." Burnett shepherded "Myth of the Heart" before handing production off to collaborator Emile Kelman.

A hybrid of folk, Americana, country and bluegrass, "Myth of the Heart" makes good on Smith's promise. Melodic and often heartbreaking, it's an assured debut, an elaborately painted canvas anchored by Smith's poetic songwriting and otherworldly voice. And all from a 21-year-old.

Although, as Smith would tell you, youth can be deceiving.

Maturity beyond her years

It's hard not zero in on the contrast between Smith's age and her world-weary, astonishingly wise musical view. Talking about the album at Progress Coffee on a late August afternoon, she appears almost improbably fresh-faced, rail-thin and impossibly easygoing.

"People say that about me a lot. 'But you're so young!' And I am, I know that's true," says Smith. "But the thing is, I may be young, but I've been doing this for a really long time. I started singing and writing before I can remember. I've always done both of those things."