An exciting day: Sassafrass is launching a Kickstarter to support Sundown: Whispers of Ragnarok! We have some really exciting plans for Balticon and for the CD (period-accurate costumes, eco-friendly packaging, filming the play to make a DVD), and we need your help to make them happen. This is our first time trying out something like this and we have high hopes that with our fans backing us up through Kickstarter, our most ambitious project yet can get off the ground. Check out our project page and preorder your CD and DVD now!
You can support The Sundown Project at any level! We have exciting ways to say thank you:
- For just $1 or more we will thank you personally on the Contributors page of our website, and at higher levels we will also thank you in the CD and DVD.
- For just $10, you can pre-order a digital download of the finished album, while for $25 you can pre-order the CD itself, or for $50 the CD and DVD.
- For those who pledge more, we have such exciting items as a poster with a beautiful illustration of the Norse Cosmos produced by comics artist friend Rob Snyder, another poster with images from the International Space Station celebrating our space exploration song “Somebody Will“, a libretto, and bound collections of our sheet music.
- Exclusive thank-you items include a certificate with your name in Runes, and, at high levels, advanced digital access to the tracks as we finish them, before the CD is released.
- We also have exciting stretch goals planned!
“Your name in Runes.” One of our ways of saying thank-you to our Kickstarter backers.
We have uploaded a lot of new music samples to go with the Kickstarter, as well as lots of new info about the Sundown Project. Both on the Kickstarter page and on our new main page you can hear streaming samples of the new recording of My Brother My Enemy, which demonstrates our new recording tech, plus the new Futhark Song and a sample of the finale of the cycle, Longer in Stories than Stone. Our info page about the Play also has new recordings of the Character Themes, and you can hear all the new samples on the Sundown Preview digital album.
For more information, check out our Kickstarter page, and thank you for helping us bring Ragnarok to life!
But there’s even more news: Three New Digital Releases!
To replace our retired albums, Sassafrass has three new online albums available through Bandcamp.
These are the results of our efforts to clean up our old sound, and reorganize our music, new and old, to give people the best taste of the new improved sound quality our new recording and editing techniques can produce. We have reorganized our old tracks, taken down a lot of the old and rough ones, and consolidated the cleaner ones into three new collections:
Sundown: Whispers of Ragnarok – Preview is our way of sharing what we have of the still-in-progress Sundown Norse Myth Song Cycle. It contains the final recordings of “My Brother, My Enemy” and both versions of “The Futhark Song” (the sweet one and a new eerie modal arrangement), just as they will appear on the final CD. It also contains recordings of the seven Character Themes which recur throughout the song cycle, letting you spot the influence of each character in the larger pieces. As a final bonus, it contains a sample of the six-part finale piece “Longer in Stories than Stone” which is still in production, plus it comes with downloadable PDFs including a lyrics sheet for “My Brother, My Enemy,” one for “The Futhark Song” featuring the original runic characters, and the sheet music for the Character Themes.
Make Them All Real collects the best tracks from our past albums, digitally remastered by our new sound editors. They have been re-balanced for volume, filtered for improved microphone quality, and have enhanced clarity of sound and lyrics. In addition to such favorites as “Somebody Will” and “Fall”, this collection contains a new recording of one of our Norse pieces, the solo version of “A New World (Frigg’s Song), which will appear as a trio on the finished Sundown CD. As a bonus, the complete album purchase comes with downloadable PDFs of the lyrics sheets with guitar parts for “Somebody Will” and “Threadbare Dragon,” formatted to help you learn and perform them.
Remnants and Alternates collects favorite rougher takes from all our old collections, trying to gather the best take of each of the pieces we have not yet had a chance to rerecord, plus favorite old versions, gathering selections from six different albums into one. It also contains two live concert recordings never before released online!
All three are available for $5 each through our bandcamp site, and sales help pay for the production of Sundown.
A fourth collection is coming soon! We often receive requests from friends and fans who still want access to retired rough tracks, which may not be our cleanest, but are still fun. We are gathering a selection of the best retired tracks and will soon make them available on our website, both streaming and for free download. Stay posted!
It’s a big day, and this is going to be the most exciting month Sassafrass has had, with the Kickstarter, three digital releases, and the long-awaited debut of the stage version of Sundown at Balticon. None of this would be possible without the support and encouragement of our many friends, so thank you for being part of this project, and we hope you enjoy!
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