Mikaela Davis

Every universe begins with a singular point, a quiet corner where instinct speaks loudest, where existential imagination can stretch its limbs. For acclaimed harpist and songwriter Mikaela Davis’ new album, Graceland Way (Kill Rock Stars), that singularity was a hillside home in Chevy Chase Canyon, a spot nestled in Los Angeles County where time slowed, the world fell away, and Davis could create from a sense of warmth and deep attentiveness. The “canyon country” epic born of that care ties a neo-western future back to the lineage of Laurel Canyon, the mythos of Elvis’s Graceland, and Paul Simon’s restless reinvention—a place where Davis can explore the fragile balance of light and dark, grace and struggle, rose and thorn, as well as the mystical power found at their nexus. Across Graceland Way, Davis’ harp masterfully powers the wide variety of soundscapes, taking on an ecstatic range of emotional color. “At the end of the journey, the place you were destined for all along isn’t even a place, it’s a state of mind: Graceland Way,” Davis says. “It’s all interconnected and the universe balances itself. You need the dark to see the light, and the most beauty usually happens where the two meet.”