ON TOUR: Portland singer/songwriter Shelley Short played songs from her newest release, "Water for the Day," April 25 at the Blackwater Café in Stockton. Tonight the 28-year-old will again play in the Valley, this time at Modesto's Deva Café in a line-up with several other bands.

You probably haven’t heard of a 28-year-old singer/songwriter named Shelley Short.

But give it time. The Portland, Ore. folk singer — who floats in the same musical circle with the Decemberists and M. Ward and evokes comparisons to Cat Power and Emmylou Harris — is making a name for herself.

With her simple, moody acoustic guitar and a sometimes haunting little-girl voice, Short has come a long way since she first picked up a guitar seven short years ago.

She’s put out three CDs, signed to Portland’s Hush Records and this week, drove up and down the west coast to promote her newest release, “Water for the Day.”

Short wrote the CD’s 11 tracks a year and a half ago, over the course of a move from Chicago to Los Angeles, where her boyfriend was seeking work as a video editor.

L.A. didn’t last — she and her boyfriend went home to Portland six months later — but Short did walk away with a collection of sweet songs that incorporate the emotions of box-packing and good-byes.

“A lot of it is about, ‘Woah, what is L.A. going to be like?’ and about leaving friends,” Short said Friday, April 25, before playing a set to a small crowd at Stockton’s Blackwater Café.

That feeling of upheaval starts right from the get-go of Short’s new album.

“Silver and gold, silver and gold, I will miss you when I grow old,” begins the new CD’s first track, concluding with the line, “It tangles my mind to see you behind.”

Other tracks are more whimsical — like “25,” a four-line, 58-second number that teases, “Cry, cry, cry / Dry your weeping eyes / Your teeth are turning black and you’re only 25.”

Short plays the guitar and sings every track; guest musicians who have played with Bright Eyes, M. Ward and the Decemberists are also heard throughout.

Tonight, Friday, May 2, Short will perform solo as part of the “Off The Air” concert series at Deva Café in Modesto. Her tour ends tomorrow with a show in Davis.

After that, she heads back to Portland to get back to her regular life — and her day job, at a non-profit that hooks up public school kids with reading mentors.

Short said she plans to keep making music, but doesn’t know where her career will lead.

“I like doing it, but it’s not like I’m banking on it,” she said. “I just think that I really enjoy it.”