Ruthie Foster

From houses of worship to houses of blues, Ruthie Foster has always been a rafter-rattler. And with a soul-filled voice honed in Texas churches, she can move audiences to tears or ecstasy — sometimes in a single song. Her last two albums, 2009’s The Truth According to Ruthie Foster and 2012’s Let It Burn, moved the Recording Academy to deliver Best Blues Album Grammy nominations; her latest, Promise of a Brand New Day, released in August 2015 on Blue Corn Music, could make her a contender once more. 

Classic influences can be felt elsewhere, including “Second Coming,” a civil-rights protest song in the folk-gospel tradition, with handclaps and a strummed acoustic guitar. “When you see me talk about my country life and picking Mustang grapes, and referencing people like Mississippi John Hurt and Jessie Mae Hemphill, that’s a way of grounding myself,” she says. “People connect to that, and that’s when the energy starts building, and then I can get to the big stuff and have some fun and wave my dreadlocks around.”

She draws on those roots for “New,” a gorgeous song written by and featuring Reagon. But unlike Foster’s last release, Promise of a Brand New Day is not covers-oriented, nor, lest one get the wrong impression, is it a gospel album.

“If anything, I stayed with that old-school soul feel,” Foster says. “Meshell wanted to make it a point for me to write more songs for this one, and I did too. I wasn’t sure I had that in me, but I did some diggin’.”