American-born Ladino singer and songwriter Sarah Aroeste, who has spent a decade expanding the possibilities of contemporary Ladino song, will release GRACIA on Aroeste Music on May 22, 2012.

Backed by flickers of flamenco and gorgeous pan-Mediterranean melodies, by lush strings and purring guitars, Aroeste’s airy, voice and lyrics invigorate age-old wedding songs, love ballads, and tributes to history’s unsung heroines.

“It doesn’t matter that 99.99% of the world doesn’t understand Ladino,” Aroeste explains. “The themes are universal, the same themes people explore today: going off to war, unrequited love, crushes, death, family dynamics. The music has crossed geographic boundaries and political ones, and the songs are often very celebratory of women--and very sexy.”

In original songs, Aroeste tells the neglected story of Dona Gracia Naci, a 15th-century Spanish answer to Harriet Tubman, who boldly rescued Jewish families from the Inquisition (“Gracia”), who epitomizes the strength and courage of our foremothers. “It’s a Ladino feminist anthem of sorts,” smiles Aroeste, whose poetic tribute to Gracia is framed by a stirring sample of Gloria Steinem.

Using a traditional ballad as a springboard for her own poetry, Aroeste reimagines the wanderings of her Sephardic ancestors—and her own journey to discover her roots—through the eyes of the traditional figure of the morena, the dark-eyed nomad girl, traveling for centuries and drained of her beauty by a harsh world in “Chika Morena.”