Bluegrass in New York

[Thile] and Mr. Daves simply plunge into classic bluegrass songs — from Bill Monroe, the Stanley Brothers, the Louvin Brothers, Flatt & Scruggs — and sing and play the daylights out of them…. That means speed, first of all: breakneck lines cleanly articulated over brisk rhythm chords, with the two men switching intuitively between lead and rhythm roles. But Mr. Thile and Mr. Daves can also play with restraint and delicacy, as they did in “Silver Dagger” and “Bury Me Beneath the Willow,” making regret and renunciation shine through… In old-fashioned style, they share a single microphone, often standing so close it is a wonder that their fast-moving picking hands don’t collide. They use traditionalist close-harmony vocals, trading off higher and lower parts with Appalachian-style quavers and yips. They map out arrangements but leave room within them to egg each other on, often revving toward peaks of fiercely strummed tremolo.

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