By pmPilgrim, BLOGCRITICS.ORG
This is a truly remarkable album that is the best of both jazz and bluegrass. On American Legacies, the Del McCoury Band and The Preservation Hall Jazz Band come together to make MUSIC!
I have often described bluegrass as the "jazz" of country music, not because of any particular complexity, but due to its ensemble approach that features soloists improvising in breaks from the melody. The elements of both styles allows for variety that also breaks rules as often as they follow them. Chord changes and shared viruosity bring the listener of either genre into the center of the performance. You begin to listen for the changes, guessing and second-guessing the where the next solo will go. It becomes very participatory music.
The Del McCoury website talks about some of the other reasons why this collaboration is not unexpected. Both styles of music have, they say, "common roots in the rich musical gumbo of the American 
south in the 19th and early 20th centuries ...[with] a myriad of common influences and musical vocabularies."
south in the 19th and early 20th centuries ...[with] a myriad of common influences and musical vocabularies."
More to the point is the joy as this album brings to life some of the songs that have played in both genres for years. "Jambalaya" makes the combination sound so natural. It is almost a pure Dixieland beat. you feel that shuffle so common to the New Orleans style and want to march back down Bourbon Street. But the singers, Del and Ronnie McCoury, by that bluegrass twang, remind us that this was written by Hank Williams, Sr. It belongs to New Orleans and has its home in the country.
Read more: http://www.seattlepi.com/lifestyle/blogcritics/article/Music-Review-Del-McCoury-Band-and-Preservation-1463661.php#ixzz1SC1J3CmU
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