David Grisman and Tony Rice: Tone Poems.

Anyone who is familiar with bluegrass/folk music will be familiar with both David Grisman and Tony Rice. For anyone who isn't, they are considered amongst the very best on their respective instruments: Grisman on mandolin and Rice on guitar.

This recording features just the two of them on guitar and mandolin, playing on a variety of vintage instruments. Fantastic tone all around from wonderful Martins and Gibsons from the 1890s to the modern day.  These old instruments are generally recognised to be the holy grail for acoustic sounds. And when instruments such as these are combined with musicians such as this, the results are wonderful.

The other thing I really enjoy is that both of them are "playing for the song" at all times. Too often with musicians, projects like this become launching pads for musical masturbation. These guys show restraint and highlight the melody at all times.

I'm not going to recommend any individual tracks: they're all fantastic. All the songs are available on this Youtube video. But I'd recommend getting the CD. The tones and recordings are incredible. You wont get the audio quality from this video: