It makes sense that Jess Williamson, an Austin native, titled her most recent release Native State. Unique, haunting and poetic, it doesn’t feel like your typical folk and country-inspired music from the South. It is connected in sound and spirit to the deep heart of Texas but has the ability to transport listeners to places of comfort, calm and contentment. She does this with spare instrumentation—a simple banjo line underpinned with a groaning cello, a bass run snaking around a dobro slide—and her emotive singing.

Check her out at SXSW:

• 3/11 – Audiofemme Presents: Emerging Artists of 2014 @ The Parish Underground (3:00 p.m.)
• 3/12 – Modern Outsider Records Official Showcase @ The Parish Underground (8:00 p.m.)
• 3/13 – Strange Victory Day Party @ Maison D’Etoile (1:00 p.m.)
• 3/13 – You’re Here @ Up Collective (4:45 p.m.)
• 3/14 – Catamount Audio Visual & Paper Accordion @ Coldtowne Theater (4:45 p.m.)
• 3/14 – Future of Music Showcase @ Shiner’s Saloon (5:00 p.m.)
• 3/15 – Bright Futures @ Maison D’Etoile (4:45 p.m.)