Monroe announces new CD

The album was recorded with producer Dave Cobb in Nashville's RCA Studio A. Monroe released the song Hands on You today.

After releasing her Grammy-nominated LP "The Blade" in 2015, Monroe started writing songs that realized themselves in unexpected ways - nudged loose after working through trauma and turmoil from her childhood. "I was unpacking a lot of stuff," she said. "I was singing and identifying what it's like to be left. No one told me what I should do, back then, when the world started to crumble."

After losing her father when she was young, Monroe and her mother grappled with the challenging experience of learning their new roles in his absence. Through the songs of "Sparrow," Monroe and Cobb turned these experiences into moody, orchestral recordings that explore her reactions.

Working with Brendan Benson and Waylon Payne, Monroe recorded and wrote many songs on "Sparrow" while she was pregnant with her first child. "I felt powerful," said Monroe, who also is a member of Pistol Annies with Miranda Lambert and Angaleena Presley. "I wasn't puffing, I wasn't drinking wine, I was just singing."

"I knew I wanted to work with Dave," Monroe said. "All of his records are consistently awesome and classic, timeless, old and new all in one."

"Country music is a wide genre, and that's okay," Monroe said. "I don't even know what genre this record is, but I know it's me."