Rachael Sage has just released a new single and companion video, "Revelation Ground", the centrepiece track on her new Revelation Ground maxi-single. Mixed by Grammy® winner Andy Zulla, the track features Sage on vocals, acoustic guitar, and percussion with accompanying musicians Dave Eggar on cello (Esperanza Spalding, Duncan Sheik) and Jeff Allen (Marc Cohn, Edie Brickell). The official stop-motion animated companion video was created by singer-songwriter/musician Antje Duvekot.
A rich cornucopia of renditions, the maxi-single will include the single, a band version, a chamber mix, a folk mix, and an instrumental version of "Revelation Ground ". All versions of the song were produced, arranged and engineered by Sage, with contributing musicians including Doug Yowell on drums (Suzanne Vega), Russ Johnson on trumpet (Elvis Costello), and Jack Petruzzelli on electric guitar (Rufus Wainwright).
"Revelation Ground" marks a turning point in Sage's songwriting and production, merging her lifelong reverence for '60's-era folk – a la Leonard Cohen, Pete Seeger and Simon & Garfunkel – with a weathered, hard-won perspective on the sacredness of time itself. Amidst the landscape of the pandemic, racial protest, the loss of far too many loved ones and her own cancer experience, Sage distills bright hope and beauty from perhaps her most universal lyrics yet. With a hum-along melody that sounds like it has existed forever, her voice achieves an intimate poignancy underscored by longtime collaborator Dave Eggar's rhapsodic cello playing.
Sage explains, "I thought about the lyrics to "Turn, Turn, Turn", inspired of course by the Old Testament psalm: 'A time to build up, a time to break down/A time to dance, a time to mourn/A time to cast away stones, a time to gather stones together...' These ancient and powerful words were an encouragement for me to move gracefully through personal and collective loss. I hope that 'Revelation Ground' can likewise provide comfort to listeners weathering hardships, knowing that everything is seasonal and that hope always returns."
The video was created by Antje Duvekot, who has a 2-decade long career as both a touring singer-songwriter and animator, and who has garnered critical acclaim from the animated videos she recently made for Toad The Wet Sprocket ("Starting Now"), Dar Williams ("Today and Every Day"), Eliot Bronson & Lori McKenna ("Even This Is Going To Pass"), and Eliza Gilkyson ("Promises To Keep"). Sage says of her collaboration with Duvekot, "I have admired Antje Duvekot's many and diverse talents for a very long time – from her extraordinary songwriting and singing to the artistic videos she created for herself and others. I reached out and asked her if she would like to work with me on a video for the song, and we immediately clicked on a mutual vision. I think Antje did amazing work with the imagery and the detailed characters throughout the video."
Singer, songwriter and entrepreneur Rachael Sage has shared stages with artists such as Lucius, Judy Collins, A Great Big World, Sheryl Crow and Melissa Etheridge. In addition to being a Billboard-charting musician and producer, Sage is a philanthropic advocate who has raised money for a wide range of causes, including Foundation for Women's Cancer, WHY Hunger, American Refugee Committee, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Hospital and National Network For Youth (NN4Y). She is also the founder of MPress Records, a unique boutique label launched two decades ago which has released over 20 of her own albums and EP’s, while maintaining a diverse roster of folk, pop, rock and country artists including Seth Glier, Grace Pettis and A Fragile Tomorrow.
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