Austin Jazz Singer Sarah Sharp Releases New Album “Déjà Vu” This Spring
The Austin jazz singer on her new album, her journey to jazz and nearly a decade at the Elephant Room
Every Thursday night at the Elephant Room, the Sarah Sharp Quintet creates something that can’t be replicated: a new, inventive sound that’s excitingly unpredictable and electric in the way only live jazz can be. Now, a new album is about to bring that feeling to listeners everywhere. Austin-based jazz singer and songwriter Sarah Sharp has been a staple of the city’s live jazz scene for years, consistently named Austin’s Best Jazz performer. Her signature sound weaves jazz, vintage pop and folk into something timeless, while her range stretches easily across Americana, pop and old-school country.
TRIBEZA sat down with Sharp ahead of the release of her new album, “Déjà Vu,” with Spaceflight Records, available May 15, 2026. Recorded live, one take at a time, with musicians she’s played alongside for decades, the album offers inviting renditions of iconic jazz favorites and what Sharp herself calls a “gateway jazz album.” One musician friend summed it up best: it’s a make-your-lover-dinner playlist. Hear the journey to this record in her own words, all the way from the start.
Can you tell us about how your journey into jazz and songwriting first began?
SS: I grew up just around a lot of music and thought everybody could sing. I was in a choir in Houston in high school that was really transformative and a big deal, and I ended up at Berklee College of Music for my bachelor’s. I didn’t know anything about jazz until I got there at all. I didn’t grow up listening to it, so I was quite the late bloomer. I had not written a song yet until the last semester of college.
I graduated a year early, so when I was 21, I moved to London. The first shows I played were there. I spent a year and a half, almost two years, getting my feet wet. I didn’t know a soul in London. I had an aunt near Oxford and that was my only safety net. The very first thing I did was go to the Monday night blues jam at this well-known place in Soho called Ain’t Nothin’ But.
That led to me knowing musicians, getting into bands, and eventually having a jazz gig every Friday and Saturday. When I moved back to Austin, I was married — I had eloped when I was 22 with an Englishman — and we played together for years. One of my first steady gigs in Austin was at the Ritz upstairs, where the Comedy Mothership is now. I had a weekly jazz residency there. I was starting to be known as a jazz singer, but I really wanted to be a songwriter. I focused more on that for many years, playing at Saxon Pub and everywhere.
When I had my kids, it was really hard to play. My husband and I couldn’t do gigs together because we couldn’t afford the babysitter for us both to be there. So I reached out to Slim Richey saying, “I sing jazz and it has been years, but I still have my charts and all my keys from college if you ever need a sub.” And I ended up with a gig that week. That turned into seven and a half years of playing withSlim Richey — the last seven and a half years of his life.
We played over 200 shows a year for seven years. And so, I was steeped back in jazz, particularly the Viper jazz from the ’30s and ’40s. We ended up making a record where I co-wrote all but two of the songs with Austin musicians, as if they were from the Viper era. A lot of the reason I wanted to do that is because I work in music supervision and write for production music and I wanted original material we could try to get used in film and TV. We had a really successful run with that record right before Slim (Richey) died.
Slim (Richey) passed away in 2015. That’s when I started playing with Mitch Watkins — it’s coming up on 11 years that he and I have played together. He’s an equally legendary treasure. He was Leonard Cohen’s guitar player from the ’70s until, on and off, Cohen’s very last gig. Total Austin treasure. My drummer Masumi Jones and I have 17 and a half years together.
You have had a residency at the Elephant Room for almost nine years. How has that been?
SS: It’s the rhythm of our lives and it means a lot to us. Every week, we’re true to music and to each other and to ourselves. It’s changing, but the cumulative effect is we’re always playing at least once a week. We keep this ever-evolving, living, breathing thing going because it’s jazz.
Even if a song isn’t strictly a jazz standard, there are jazz musicians who can play anything. A third to a half of what we play on any given Thursday are songs I’ve written, but it’s never played exactly the same because nobody’s been taught their part that they have to do every single time. It’s improvised. That’s half of what makes jazz, jazz. Little happy accidents happen — you realize things like, “Oh, Oliver should play accordion on this instead of piano.” Those things give it a really organic, authentic quality.
And every time, we’re also bringing in just week after week of what we’re all living through, like if somebody’s been sick or lost a parent, or how hard it is to pay bills and stay in Austin. We’re bringing a lot of lived, embodied experience to it.
Mitch has been through a lot physically. It’s harder and harder for him, but (after the show) he says to me, some version of, “Good night, Sarah. I always feel better when I’m leaving here than when I got here.”
Your upcoming album “Déjà Vu” is set to release in May. How did it come together? Are any of the songs live performances?
SS: Eric Johnson — the amazing, world-renowned and genius guitar player based in Austin — came to a show. I didn’t know him, and we became friends. While he was on the Jimi Hendrix Experience tour, he said, “If you just pay my engineer, I want to let you use my studio.” That’s what made us finally take the plunge. We needed at least two days in a row, and it turned out there was a Sunday and a Monday we could take the opportunity.
Every song on the record is one take. The most takes we did was three. “It’s Been a Long, Long Time” was done in only did one take. “Don’t Think Twice” was also done in one take, including the vocal. We didn’t redo anything. Out of the 11 songs, I kept even the vocal that happened in the moment on three of them. That is, of course, the result of playing together for so many years.
What inspired you to lead with “Don’t Think Twice, It’s All Right” as the first single?
SS: It seems to land. And I think you don’t have to be a jazz lover to appreciate that recording. A lot of the record hopefully is going to be kind of like a “gateway” jazz album.
The album has been described as intimate and nocturnal. What atmosphere are you hoping to create for listeners?
SS: A musician friend said it’s like a “make your lover dinner” playlist. It’s very romantic. Even the songs that are about longing and loss, it’s all because of how exquisitely beautiful it is to have that union with the beloved. Even the playful ones, it’s all about longing for connection and union. It’s an opportunity to just feel a bunch of things that are real and true about being human — the longing, the loss, the union, the connection, the struggles and the dreaming.
How has Austin influenced this album?
SS: There’s an element of irreverence. We don’t take ourselves, or any idea of the rules of jazz, that seriously. I also think you can hear some Texas in it. There are moments … I’m not going to say country, but it gets into a little bit of Americana, whispers of it. And all of the struggles — the reality of being a musician in Austin, keeping the lights on, all the side hustles, everything you do to stay and live anywhere near Austin and then have the privilege of showing up and getting to make the music. Every time one of us has had to rise from the ashes of one thing or another, you hear it. It’s like anything that has to struggle to thrive.
We haven’t had the music industry making decisions every step of the way. These same musicians, if they were in New York, they could hang with anybody — but they’d be dealing with the label and the managers and the booking agents. This is a total bootstrap indie.
What’s on the horizon for you and the band?
SS: What’s on our mind right now is we’re going to Japan. Masumi (Jones) is from Japan, and she sent our EPK to someone she knew. We had just done a listening event at the Equipment Room where we were explaining the mission, and Spaceflight Records was there. That night we got home and there was an invitation from a jazz festival in Osaka.
Sharp has a string of shows coming up to celebrate. On March 20, she plays two shows (8 and 10 p.m.) at the new Monks location in South Austin — the only time she plans to perform the album in full, in order. On April 9, another single “I Think It’s Going To Rain Today” will release ahead of the full album. Her Thursday Elephant Room residency shows continue as usual, with the exception of April 16 and April 30, when the band will be taking their sounds overseas. On May 13, she and her band perform at Waterloo Records for an in-store show, giving fans a two-day jump on the May 15th release date.
To listen to her single “Don’t Think Twice, It’s All Right” click here. To pre-save the album click here.
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