Sierra Hull

When Sierra Hull was only 10, the mandolin prodigy from a tiny town on the Tennessee-Kentucky border self-released her first album; by the time she was 13, she had inked a deal with the venerable Rounder Records. Now, more than two decades later, Hull has become a vital piece of the modern progressive bluegrass firmament, finding new contexts as an instrumentalist, composer, and singer that goad the genre forward. In her early years, Hull followed in the footsteps of Alison Krauss and Béla Fleck, mentors who produced some of Hull’s first Rounder albums as she became a perennial winner at the International Bluegrass Music Association Awards. But Hull steadily broadened her stylistic reach, first joining Sturgill Simpson’s stacked bluegrass outfit and then releasing 25 Trips, an expansive record that gently pushed into outlaw country and psychedelia.

“You can be coming into your own your entire life, you know?” Hull told The Bluegrass Situation in 2025. “It looks different at 16, and it looks different at 20, it looks different at 25, and it looks different now in my 30s.” Indeed, since the pandemic, Hull has toured and partnered with jam-world star Cory Wong, appeared alongside Billy Strings on Austin City Limits, and written a bluegrass concerto called The Movements, full of dynamic swings and dazzling playing. What’s more, her 2025 album, A Tip Toe High Wire, is not only her best but also her most broad, as she’s finally independent again, free of label expectations. “Boom” rides a classic folk-rock groove into the depths of Laurel Canyon, while “Lord, That’s a Long Way” tucks an entire suite into a three-minute meditation on grief. Hull was a special mandolin player at an age when most kids are still trying to grasp complex multiplication; she is now a multifaceted bluegrass star.