Sassafrass: Sundown: Whispers of Ragnarok, The Kickstarter

So, as I'm sure I've mentioned a couple of dozen times once or twice on this journal, I'm in a musical group called Sassafrass. We perform polyphonic vocal music, a cappella or with light accompaniment, with words and music by my dear friend Ada Palmer. We've been working together for more than twelve years.

And right now we're doing the largest project we've ever done: a musical retelling of the history of the world according to Norse mythology, from the creation of the cosmos through its destruction at Ragnarok, based on the original sources in the Eddas. This retelling, Sundown: Whispers of Ragnarok, is going to be an album, which we are in the process of recording. It's also going to be a play, which we will be performing live and in period costume as the musical guests of honor at Balticon 2013 this upcoming weekend. We've hired a video crew to film the Balticon performance and will be making that available on DVD so that people who can't make it to the convention can still see the full performance.

The music is entirely written, the play is in rehearsal, and we've got some tracks laid down. But the members of our group live in widely scattered locations around the country, and as a group which performs primarily at conventions we don't make any money from ticket sales. In addition, producing and distributing an album has associated costs, as do the filming, production, and distribution of the DVD.

Therefore, we've put up a Kickstarter, which will be running from now until June 16th. Click through for the video of our project proposal, plus embedded audio so you can hear what the music sounds like. Samples include a duet between Odin and Loki describing their friendship and the way it fell apart, multiple versions of the Norse alphabet song, and a preview of the finale song.

The full list of reward tiers is available at the site, but I should mention that various tiers do include the CD in digital form, physical form, or both, the performance DVD, and the libretto and sheet music of the Sundown project. At higher levels, we're offering associated artwork and even the chance for a private house concert.

And if we hit $10,000, Jo Walton, Hugo and Nebula-award winning author and friend of the group, will write an Odin-themed poem set in the world of Sundown: Whispers of Ragnarok and post it for the world to see for free on her Livejournal. If we hit $14,000, Jo will write a Loki-themed followup to her Odin poem, which will be sent only to backers.

This is where I urge you to back our Kickstarter for the rather selfish reason that I want to read the poetry.

So, to reiterate: the Kickstarter is here! And it runs until June 16th.

Here's the group's main website.

And thank you for reading this.

Sassafrass: Sundown: Whispers of Ragnarok, The Kickstarter

So, as I'm sure I've mentioned a couple of dozen times once or twice on this journal, I'm in a musical group called Sassafrass. We perform polyphonic vocal music, a cappella or with light accompaniment, with words and music by my dear friend Ada Palmer. We've been working together for more than twelve years.

And right now we're doing the largest project we've ever done: a musical retelling of the history of the world according to Norse mythology, from the creation of the cosmos through its destruction at Ragnarok, based on the original sources in the Eddas. This retelling, Sundown: Whispers of Ragnarok, is going to be an album, which we are in the process of recording. It's also going to be a play, which we will be performing live and in period costume as the musical guests of honor at Balticon 2013 this upcoming weekend. We've hired a video crew to film the Balticon performance and will be making that available on DVD so that people who can't make it to the convention can still see the full performance.

The music is entirely written, the play is in rehearsal, and we've got some tracks laid down. But the members of our group live in widely scattered locations around the country, and as a group which performs primarily at conventions we don't make any money from ticket sales. In addition, producing and distributing an album has associated costs, as do the filming, production, and distribution of the DVD.

Therefore, we've put up a Kickstarter, which will be running from now until June 16th. Click through for the video of our project proposal, plus embedded audio so you can hear what the music sounds like. Samples include a duet between Odin and Loki describing their friendship and the way it fell apart, multiple versions of the Norse alphabet song, and a preview of the finale song.

The full list of reward tiers is available at the site, but I should mention that various tiers do include the CD in digital form, physical form, or both, the performance DVD, and the libretto and sheet music of the Sundown project. At higher levels, we're offering associated artwork and even the chance for a private house concert.

And if we hit $10,000, Jo Walton, Hugo and Nebula-award winning author and friend of the group, will write an Odin-themed poem set in the world of Sundown: Whispers of Ragnarok and post it for the world to see for free on her Livejournal. If we hit $14,000, Jo will write a Loki-themed followup to her Odin poem, which will be sent only to backers.

This is where I urge you to back our Kickstarter for the rather selfish reason that I want to read the poetry.

So, to reiterate: the Kickstarter is here! And it runs until June 16th.

Here's the group's main website.

And thank you for reading this.

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