Sage Bond delights Stage 49 audience with debut of “Prisoner”

By Jason Morgan Edwards
Special to the Times

ALBUQUERQUE

If you’ve ever heard her voice, you’ll recognize it instantly. It’s a soulful blend of Etta James and Chris Cornell.

Sage Bond’s acoustic metal ballads are known throughout the Navajo Nation. She’s been featured on a movie soundtrack; as a familiar face and voice on Jir Anderson’s Native Guitars Tour; as a featured performer at Gathering of Nations and the Miss Native American USA pageant; and as a speaker/performer for the Navajo Nation’s Building Communities of Hope program, where she has been a key advocate in suicide prevention.

And she is soon to add Diné College graduate to her list of accomplishments. Bond will be completing her associate degree in liberal arts at the end of May. She was well received by the Stage 49 crowd last weekend at the annual Gathering of Nations Powwow. Bond debuted “Prisoner,” her latest full CD.

“I finally have a new LP,” she said. “It has nine original songs. It’s been four years since my last release, the self-titled EP. I’m really glad to have put an album together.

The songs mean a lot to me. This is part of healing. And, I’m proud of it.” The production was truly a family effort. The CD was recorded and produced at Wolf Track Studios, which happens to be owned and operated by Michael Begay, a close friend of the family. The cover art was done by Bond’s young brother, Sequoyah, who recently turned 11 years old. And her mother, Melinda, had significant input on the sound engineering, as well as being Bond’s biggest supporter.

---