Becky Buller is at least as well known as a bluegrass songwriter -- I first heard of her when I noticed her byline on various albums in the genre -- as a performer. These days her busy performance schedule as lead vocalist and fiddler (and occasional clawhammer banjoist) in her own band is raising her profile ever higher, and deservedly so.

Crepe Paper Heart, the fourth of her solo albums if the first I've heard, is crisply produced with a sparkling lineup consisting of her road band as well as guest artists Sam Bush, Rob Ickes, Rhonda Vincent, Claire Lynch, the Fairfield Four and others. All but the last cut (#12, identified as "bonus track") are Buller's own or co-own. Buller delivers the lyrics in a clear, direct voice suited to her contemporary-bluegrass sensibility sometimes bordering on acoustic country-pop (and sometimes, as on the pop ballad "Maybe," written with Bobby Starnes, going over to the other side). With the occasional honorable exception I am not a fan of pop ballads, and this is not one of the exceptions. I concede, naturally, that mileage varies on these things.

Otherwise, I admire Buller's way of handling familiar themes, such as "The Heart of the House" (with Sarah Majors) and "She Loved Sunflowers," about the death of a beloved family member, expressed with manifestly sincere emotion but without the mawkishness bluegrass and country so often attach to the subject. In the closest she gets to engaging with traditions that fed into bluegrass' mighty stream, she plays mountain banjo to story-songs set in 19th-century America, "The Rebel & the Rose" (with Tony Rackley) and "Calamity Jane" (with Tim Stafford). I wonder if she or her co-writer has read Richard D. Etulain's authoritative 2014 biography The Life & Legends of Calamity Jane.

Sister Sadie comprises five women who have made names for themselves in bluegrass and in some cases other genres. I reviewed the first album in this space on 9 July 2016. II is more of the same, to continuing happy effect. Most immediately gratifying are the harmonies. The lead singing isn't bad, either. Dale Ann Bradley (guitar), as able a bluegrass vocalist as any now working, handles five of the 12 numbers, while Tina Adair (mandolin/guitar) leads four, including the smart, surprising "900 Miles," learned from Woody Guthrie's variant of the ubiquitous post-Civil War folk song known in many forms and under miscellaneous titles.

Bradley tackles "Washed My Face in the Morning Dew," the great Tom T. Hall ballad detailing a traveler's observations of the casual cruelty human beings practice. Eric Kaz/Libby Titus's chronicle of romantic desperation, "Love Has No Pride," usually associated with the early Bonnie Raitt, translates with unexpected conviction under Adair's soulful treatment into sentiment fitted for bluegrass. "Since I Laid My Burden Down" has the considerable advantage of Bradley's voice at the forefront, but the keen-edged picking serves to propel this venerable spiritual even deeper into space toward the heavenly realms.

It has to be said, and I said it last time too, that the occasional piece is less than fully inspired. Two or three compositional exercises seem so rote as to afford the impression of having been dredged up in somebody's sleep. In those instances I advise ignoring the material and focusing on the still-exemplary arrangement. All Sister Sadie needs to put together a solid, maybe even classic, album is a more consistently strong song selection. Here, as before, the highlights, which are considerable, carry the show.

The Kathy Kallick Band hails from the West Coast, the Bay Area specifically. It's been around for a while. Its claim to bluegrass identity is not disputable. It is, however, unlike the bluegrass of Southern states. Like her contemporary and occasional recording partner Laurie Lewis, Kathy Kallick emerged from the California folk scene. That fact, manifested in a sharp awareness of pre-bluegrass traditional music, has always helped shape her repertoire. It keeps the sound from ever straying into cliche. Put a Kallick album on, and you know you're in for songs, arrangements and performances at the highest level. And you will never have your intelligence insulted.

As the title implies, Horrible World carries a strong element of social commentary directed at this particularly unsettled, chaotic moment in our national journey, but the criticism is laced with hope and humor, the commentary subtext as much as text. I'm certain that the opening cut, a Kallick original titled "Ride Away," is a political allegory, and a good one, but you won't have to hear it that way. In fact, if you object to the point of view, it's just as well you don't. On the other hand, if you do, it'll beam light through gloom. Another Kallick composition, "Nothin' So Bad (It Can't Get Worse)," highlights her cheerily rueful sense of humor. The title song, another original, ends on an unlikely positive note. And her "The Sunday Road" is an affectionate but dry-eyed remembrance of life on the old home place, touched by a melody made for heavy rotation thereafter on the mental jukebox.

The Western-swing standard "Boot Heel Drag" (Herb Remington) recalls a genre that influenced bluegrass in its formative days. "My Honey Lou" is a seldom covered Carter Family song, a delightfully unpredicted choice. Still, even amid all the superior music and musicianship, "Cotton Eyed Joe" is the standout, brilliantly reinvented for 5:43's worth of play; most performers zip through it in barely more than two minutes. Kallick and her band break it into parts, in a leisurely exploration of its component beauty, joy and mystery. Where did he come from? Where did he go? Why did he keep the singer from getting married a long time ago? Questions, questions. Just about everything I love about American folk music is in that song. Kallick and companions lay down an adaptation for the ages.