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Michael Ray knew exactly where he wanted to film his new music video. The country artist took to his Florida hometown to bring his song, “Holy Water,” to life at the picturesque white church that he grew up attending with his family. Cassia Baptist Church, located in Eustis, Florida, dates back to the late 1800s, and it’s where Ray’s family has attended “for generations and generations.
Ray live-streamed a quick Q&A session with fans and told the background story of the church before he premiered the music video on Wednesday (March 16). The church that’s still active today is the one where Ray went to Vacation Bible School, where her performed in an Easter play, and where he got in trouble for acting up in the back pew as a kid. Though the preacher and the deacon were paid actors, Ray revealed that everyone else was from the Eustis, Florida community. “I wanted it to be very authentic,” he said in his livestream. There’s “so much history in this song.”
“Holy Water” is on of the tracks included on Ray’s Higher Education, his 7-track EP that released last year. Ashley Gorley, Hunter Phelps, Ben Johnson and Michael Hardy wrote the track, which follows “Whiskey and Rain,” “Just The Way I Am” and others. Ray said when he released the EP in August: “Higher Education is about going through life and the hard knocks that make you who you are ... coming out of it stronger, having let it change you without hardening you. This album reminds me that even though we all go through hard times, we grow and we’re better for it.”
Ray called it a “full-circle moment” to debut a music video filmed at his hometown church. “I’m very passionate about it.” Watch Ray’s latest music video for “Holy Water” here:
Watch his pre-premiere livestream here: