The Sage Warrior Album

Listen now:

“Steeped in Sikh devotional themes, with an anthemic Punjabi sound.” — NPR Music

“This is a very important song to me – drawing from the revolutionary words of Guru Nanak over 500 years ago yet so relevant in today’s world.” – Sonny Singh

“Langar was more than a rebellion: It was a practice for an alternative world of solidarity, dignity, and humility.” – Valarie Kaur

“I see this sacred poetry and music as a call to action to speak up and stand up for the oppressed, from Punjab to Palestine.” – Sonny Singh

“Know the light within all, ask not of caste: there are no hierarchies in the world beyond.” – Guru Nanak (as quoted in “Jaano Jot”)

“Her writing puts our community’s history and struggles into language that I needed to hear—that our generation needs to hear.” – Sonny Singh

“The album Sage Warrior is a genre-crossing, twelve-song odyssey into ancestral wisdom from the critically acclaimed singer, trumpeter, and songwriter Sonny Singh. The album explores the Sikh spirit of the sant sipahi, the sage warrior: the sage leads with love; the warrior answers the call to courage. Introspective and urgent, spiritual and rebellious, the album offers bold new renditions of Sikh devotional poems from South Asia, channeling ancestral wisdom for our time. Singh created the album as a companion to the new book Sage Warrior by visionary civil rights leader and bestselling author Valarie Kaur. Each track on the album accompanies a chapter in the book. Together, the Sage Warrior book and album offer an electrifying multisensory experience of Sikh wisdom—a clarion call to love, devotion, and courage in dark times...”

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SAGE WARRIOR book release, album, and tour!

Brooklyn-based Sonny Singh is celebrated for bold and joyous musical innovation.

For the last two decades, Singh gained renown as an original member of the band Red Baraat, performing on stages globally with his fiery trumpet and voice. He embarked on a solo career to explore bold new renderings of Sikh devotional music. In 2022, he released his solo debut Chardi Kala to critical acclaim: “Singh has done that rarest of rare things as a musician—he has actually charted new ground…” (Bhanuj Kappal, Live Mint). His album broke new ground in musical-spiritual terrain: “This is Indian devotional music as Western pop with a trumpet as a driving force. To hear it is to realize there’s not much else like it anywhere” (Bruce Miller, PopMatters). Now with his second album, Singh ushers us into altogether new experiences of the sacred, channeling ancient wisdom through music, poetry, and song. The album was produced by Grammy-nominated Kaveh Rastegar, who has worked with Sting, John Legend, Ringo Starr, and De La Soul. Sage Warrior features a virtuosic roster of Sikh and non-Sikh talent on guitars, Punjabi and western drums, horns, harmonium, and synths. The result: a rich sonic journey into the world of Sikh music and beyond. At moments, traditional Punjabi rhythms transport us to the riverbanks of Punjab, where Sikh ancestors sang the sacred poems. In the next moment, we are ushered into bold new experiments in global music through soaring trumpets and epic electric guitar-driven melodies. In every track, Sonny’s powerful voice is our guide, as in the words of Annie Mok of Bandcamp Daily: “Singh’s voice arrives, like the breaking of morning sunlight, a bursting open of joy.”

The Sage Warrior album is genre-crossing, borderless, devotional, and new –

In Pavan Guru, Singh gives us an embodied experience of the interbeing of all things in a bold jubilant rendition of the sacred poem: “Air our teacher, water our father / Mother Earth, the great womb.”

In Sachau Orai, Singh’s music pulsates with reggae and dub, a nod to the spiritual roots of reggae music, connecting Sikh wisdom with a vibrant global call to action: “Higher than truth is the living of truth.”

In Janno Jot, Singh offers an anthemic declaration to dismantle caste and all forms of oppression, with a catchy Punjabi-cumbia groove: “Know the light within all, ask not of caste / there are no hierarchies in the world beyond.”

In Aval Allah, Singh musically captures the sage-poet Kabir’s radical call to Oneness: “From one light, the entire universe welled up! / So who is good and who is bad?”

In Taati Vao, a sacred poem for protection, Singh’s powerful voice and layered electric guitars shelter the listener with epic melodies: “Hot winds cannot touch me, I am shielded by the Infinite.”

In Begampura, the sage-poet Ravidas dreams of “a place without despair.” Through dreamy, lush, layered vocal harmonies, Singh invites us to imagine a world without cruelty or agony, and to feel the possibility of liberation in our bodies.

The making of the album

In making the album, Singh worked closely with Valarie Kaur as she wrote the book Sage Warrior. Singh composed new renditions of the sacred poems, shabds, that appear in each story. Singh sent her music demos as she wrote; she sent him chapters as he composed. The book inspired the album; the album inspired the book; both were inspired by Sikh wisdom. Fittingly, the penultimate track of the album features Kaur reading an excerpt of the book to an introspective improvisational soundscape in a piece called Rebirth.

“Sonny’s music captures the spirit of the sage warrior–a full-throated embrace of Oneness, and courageous call to action,” says Valarie Kaur. “He is a profoundly gifted artist, activist, and thinker who embodies revolutionary love in being and breath. It was an electrifying experience to listen to his music as I wrote, and for my writing in turn to shape the music. The book and album were birthed together.”

Singh explains, “As Valarie would send me first drafts of each chapter of the book, the music flowed out of me with so much ease. Her writing puts our community’s history and struggles into language that I needed to hear—that our generation needs to hear. I hope my music helps the ancient wisdom Valarie unearths in her book land in the hearts of listeners.”

This fall, amid what promises to be our most contentious and destabilizing election season yet, the Sage Warrior book and album will ignite us with courage, connection, and love. Starting in September 2024, Singh will join Kaur on a Revolutionary Love Tour to bring their stories and music to audiences across the U.S.

The Sage Warrior album artwork was created by Keerat Kaur, Sikh artist and architect, who generated original artwork for the book. The Sage Warrior project is a multisensory, audio-visual experience, a new offering of Sikh wisdom, a doorway into the revolutionary love movement, and medicine for everyone hungry for hope, healing, liberation, and joy.

Listen now:

About the Sage Warrior book by Valarie Kaur

“Sage Warrior is far more than a book – it’s a sacred invitation.” — Brené Brown, Ph.D., Author of the #1 NYT Bestseller Atlas of the Heart

In the book, Sage Warrior, out on September 10, 2024 (One World), Kaur presents an imaginative retelling of 250 years of epic history of the first Sikhs. In a time riven by caste, conquest, and cruelty, the first Sikhs forged the new path of the sant sipahi, the sage warrior—a figure who embodies both the sage, full of love and awe for the world as it is, and the warrior, who fights for the world as it ought to be. Each chapter focuses on a single Sikh Guru, or spiritual leader, and woman ancestor, and corresponding lesson. In the album, Singh brings each sacred poem to life. In Sikh tradition, music is the primary vehicle for wisdom: through musical poetry, wisdom lands in the body, mind, and heart.

Hailed as “a brilliant gem” by Michelle Alexander, author of the New Jim Crow, Sage Warrior offers us a new way to think about how we cultivate a discipline of courage, pleasure, and connection in seemingly catastrophic times, inspired by a rich and surprising wisdom tradition that many have very likely never explored.

The Sage Warrior Album

Listen now:

“Steeped in Sikh devotional themes, with an anthemic Punjabi sound.” — NPR Music

Sign up to be the first to hear about the SAGE WARRIOR book release, album, and tour!

Brooklyn-based Sonny Singh is celebrated for bold and joyous musical innovation.

The making of the album

Listen now:

About the Sage Warrior book by Valarie Kaur

“Sage Warrior is far more than a book – it’s a sacred invitation.” — Brené Brown, Ph.D., Author of the #1 NYT Bestseller Atlas of the Heart

Sign up to be the first to hear about the SAGE WARRIOR book release, album, and tour!

Sign up to be the first to hear about the
SAGE WARRIOR book release, album, and tour!