After taking much of 2006 off from touring, Alison Krauss and Union Station recently returned to action by fulfilling a long-standing dream touring with guitarist Tony Rice.
Rice’s 30-year career has seen him become one of the most respected figures in acoustic music with a discography that includes contemporary bluegrass and jazz.
The shows found Krauss and Union Station serving as Rice’s backing group and put Krauss on stage together with an artist whose career, she says, provided a model for her to follow.
“He’s made, in my mind, timeless records, and his records affect me long after I turn them off,” Krauss said in a recent phone interview. “They’re full of ideals and really paint a wonderful picture of the person who I believe that is, by what he chooses to sing.”
Krauss, who turns 36 this month, has done a good job in following Rice’s example so far in a recording career that is now in its 20th year and has seen her gain unprecedented success while achieving her place as the leading name in bluegrass.
Throughout her career, Krauss (like Rice, who has done trailblazing acoustic jazz albums with David Grisman, among others) has not hesitated to step beyond bluegrass from time to time.
Especially on her solo albums, Krauss has ventured into a wider range of acoustic music, with songs that have drawn strongly on folk, country and even pop.
Her new CD, “A Hundred Miles or More: A Collection,” continues that trend.
The album compiles previously released songs from soundtracks (such as “Down to the River to Pray” from “O Brother, Where Art Thou?” and “The Scarlet Tide” and “You Will Be My Ain True Love” from “Cold Mountain”); from compilations (“Baby Mine” from the 1996 CD “The Best of Country Sing the Best of Disney”); and from guest appearances on albums by other artists (“Get Me Through December” from Natalie MacMaster’s 1999 CD “In My Hands” and “Missing You,” on John Waite’s recent album, “Downtown … Journey of a Heart”).
The collaboration with Waite, who has spent his entire career in rock as a solo artist and with the bands the Babys and Bad English, may seem an unlikely pairing. But Krauss said she jumped at the chance when Waite asked her to record the new version of his signature pop hit “Missing You.”
“I’ve always loved all different kinds of music, and he’s such an incredible singer,” Krauss said. “… I have many records of his.”
Another duet with Waite, “Lay Down Beside Me,” is one of five newly recorded tracks on “A Hundred Miles or More.”
Krauss’ willingness to explore new musical territory will become even more apparent later this year with the release of a CD she recently completed with former Led Zeppelin singer Robert Plant.
Exactly how the record with Plant sounds stylistically was a subject Krauss found difficult to articulate.
“Well, it’s different for both of us. It’s hard for me to kind of describe, but it definitely took things from both of us,” Krauss said. “T Bone Burnett produced it. So it’s a different kind of thing for me and for Robert. I’m interested to see what the reaction will be to it.”
Alison Krauss and Union Station perform Saturday in Redmond.
Alison Krauss &Union Station
Featuring dobro virtuoso Jerry Douglas: 8 p.m. Saturday, Marymoor Amphitheatre, Redmond. $39.50-$69.50, Ticketmaster.
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