Chris Thile performs "God Is Alive Magic Is Afoot," based on Buffy Sainte-Marie’s adaptation of a Leonard Cohen poem, from his new album, Laysongs, in a new video. It was shot by Josh Goleman during the recording of the album at Future-Past Studio, a converted church in upstate New York. You can watch it here:

Laysongs is Chris Thile's first truly solo album: just him, his voice, and his mandolin, on new recordings of six original songs and three covers, all of which contextualize and banter with his ideas about spirituality. In addition to the above track, the album features the three-part Salt (in the Wounds) of the Earth, which was inspired by C.S. Lewis’s The Screwtape Letters; a song Thile wrote about Dionysus; a selection from Béla Bartók’s Sonata for Solo Violin; and a Hazel Dickens cover. You can hear it and pick up a copy here.

Thile can be seen performing live over two nights at Wolf Trap outside Washington, DC, this coming Saturday and Sunday. He plays a set at the Open Sky Arts Festival in Lake Placid, New York, on August 2, and tours throughout the United States this fall. See below for solo tour details and tickets, or visit nonesuch.com/on-tour.

CHRIS THILE SOLO TOUR