Home New Releases Byron Metcalf & Jennifer Grais – Sacrament

Byron Metcalf & Jennifer Grais – Sacrament

1451

Byron Metcalf and Jennifer Grais have delivered into our hands, stunning support for the sacramental. “Sacrament” – to be released on January 24, 2020 – was birthed from the ground of sacred ceremony and is structured in a way that helps guide the listener to a higher frequency where wisdom and healing energies can be accessed.

Press release by Higher Level Media

The album’s musical themes and prayers move in sync with the stages of ritual process. The sensuous power of the percussion, musical instrumentation and extraordinary vocals create a multilayered space in which one can see through the surface appearances of things­ – into the mysterious world of Spirit moving through the vast sonic landscapes.

Check out the album sampler: 

“The rich layering of indigenous instruments and percussive textures with Jennifer’s spirit-driven voice opened my heart and mind to multiple dimensions, a vaster space than my everyday mind. The “Spirit Wind” soundworld created a sense of spaciousness, as if I were out in the desert, like Castaneda, hearing the wind bounce echoes off the canyon walls, sitting by a sacred fire with the maestro don Juan Matus.”

– C. Michael Smith, Ph.D. (aka Mikkal), author of Psychotherapy and the Sacred, and Jung and Shamanism in Dialogue.

You may pre-order the album on Bandcamp.

About Byron Metcalf
Byron Metcalf is an award-winning musician and recording artist, shamanic practitioner and ceremonial leader. Byron’s highly successful music business career spans 5 decades and covers a wide variety of musical styles and genres.

Since 1997, Byron has been producing solo CD projects and collaborating with other artists including Steve Roach, Mark Seelig, Dashmesh Khalsa, Erik Wollo, Peter Phippen, Jennifer Grais, Ron Oates, and several other musical guests. Byron’s 1998 solo release “Helpers, Guides & Allies” was rated #4 in Backroads Music’s 1998 Best of Year Selections in the World Music category. Byron collaborated with award-winning recording artist and sonic innovator Steve Roach on the critically acclaimed 2-disc epic “The Serpent’s Lair” (Projekt Records, 2000). “Not Without Risk” (Dr Bam’s Music, 2001) was Byron’s second solo project followed by  “Wachuma’s Wave” (Spotted Peccary, 2003), a collaboration with German artist Mark Seelig (with Steve Roach), which was chosen by Backroads Music as the #1 Release of 2003 in all categories.

In 2005, Byron teamed up with Monroe Products to produce a “meta-music” version of Byron’s critically acclaimed “The Shaman’s Heart” (with Steve Roach).”The Shaman’s Heart with Hemi-Sync” won the 2006 Visionary Award for “Best Innerspace/Meditational/Healing CD”. Monroe Products also released a meta- music version of “Not Without Risk” (re-sequenced and re-titled as “Spirit Gathering”) in late 2006, and a meta-music version of “Wachuma’s Wave” (re-titled as “Deep Time Dreaming”) in 2007. More recent albums include “A Warning From the Elders” (Dr Bam’s Music, 2007), “Nada Terma” with Mark Seelig & Steve Roach (Projekt, 2008) “Dream Tracker” with Dashmesh Khalsa & Steve Roach (Dr Bam’s Music, 2010), and “The Shaman’s Heart II” featuring Steve Roach (Projekt, 2011). Newer albums include the collaboration with Steve Roach “Tales From The Ultra Tribe (Projekt, 2012), “Medicine Work” with Rob Thomas of “Inlakesh” (Dr Bam’s Music, 2013), “Intention” with Mark Seelig (Projekt, 2014), “Monuments

of Ecstasy” with Steve Roach & Rob Thomas (Projekt, 2015), “Spirit of Healing” with Sandra Ingerman (Sounds True, 2015), “Earth Luminous” with Erik Wollo (Projekt, 2016), “Shamanic Trance Dance” (Sounds True, 2016), “Inner Rhythm Meditations” (Sounds True, 2016), “They Were Here” with Jennifer Grais (Dr Bam’s Music, 2017), “Inner Rhythm Meditations Vol II” (Heart Dance Records, 2018), and “Persistent Visions” with Mark Seelig (Projekt, 2019).

About Jennifer Grais
Jennifer Grais is a professional singer/songwriter, shamanic practitioner, sound healer and author. She is a graduate of the 3-year advanced program for Shamanic Healing taught by Michael Harner (The Foundation for Shamanic Studies). Jennifer also studied energy healing in India at the Oneness University and completed a year-long program with Linda Kohanov, best-selling author of “The Tao of Equus”, and “Riding Between the Worlds”, to explore a deeper relationship with horses. Jennifer also apprenticed with a Native American teacher, Maria Yraceburu, and together they presented their version of the “Lakota Horse Dance” in Southern California. Her love of horses helped to inspire the direction of the visionary album, “They Were Here” a collaboration with award-winning drummer and producer Byron Metcalf.

Jennifer was the background singer for Jackson Browne for several years (1998-2005) and with some of Browne’s musicians formed a band called “Love Nugget” that performed in various LA venues. Jennifer also recorded a solo album of her own compositions titled “Woman of the Moon”.

In the summer and fall of 2002, Jennifer brought her drum and rattles into a remote cave in New Mexico where recorded a ‘stream-of consciousness’ shamanic ceremony called “The Cave”. As she sang, a hive of bees encircled her and the microphone, providing a background hum throughout the recording.

Jennifer is featured on Steve Roach’s “Fever Dreams II” album (Projekt Records, 2004) and along with Metcalf they performed with Steve at the 2004 International Transpersonal Conference in Palm Springs, CA. The conference theme was “Mythic Imagination & Modern Society: The Re- Enchantment of the World”.

In December 2006, Jennifer was captivated by footage of a horse rescue that took place during a flood in the Netherlands at the hands of women riders. The drama of the horse rescue inspired the novel, “Christa’s Luck”, a teen fiction novel co-authored by her husband, Michael Grais. Research for the novel exposed Jennifer to the unfolding drama of the wild mustangs in the western United States, which in turn revealed environmental concerns due to mining in the west on public lands where the wild horses roam, and both of these issues became a primary plot of the novel.

Jennifer is passionate about raising awareness both spiritually and environmentally through her singing, her teaching, and her sound and energy healing work. Her second musical collaboration with award-winning recording artist Byron Metcalf, Sacrament, is her most recent musical offering. Jennifer currently lives in Northern California with her husband where she leads Ceremony, drum circles, and Sound Healing events, and
works with clients individually in her healing arts practice.