I saw The Kite Runner last night (review here), which wet my appetite for world music.  And the clouds gently rolling by the blue sky out my window here brought a desire for bluegrass.  So I turned to the one and only place where the two (bluegrass & world) meet: David Grisman Quintet's "Arabia."

For those of you unfamiliar with David Grisman, he's a noteworthy mandolinist and composer of acoustic music, born in the 40s and from New Jersey.  The guy's a bad-ass, and he's been around.  Over the years, he's played with Peter Rowan, Béla Fleck, Mike Seeger, Del McCoury, Earl Scruggs, Vassar Clements, Sam Bush, Bonnie Raitt, etc etc.

He acquired the nickname "Dawg" in the 70s, given by close friend Jerry Garcia - and began a brand of music that he calls "Dawg Music" - a mixture of bluegrass, Django Reinhardt-Stéphane Grappelli-influenced jazz, Old World Mediterranean string band music and modern Jazz fusion. Grisman, along with New Grass Revival are generally considered the modern day interpreters of the new bluegrass-influenced fusion sound, sometimes called newgrass.

The 16-minute song "Arabia" is today's music, and is an excellent sample of Grisman's brilliant fusion between bluegrass and mediterranean string jazz.

http://tinyurl.com/2n2m3v

Grisman, like most great musicians, is best experienced live.  He still tours today with the David Grisman Quintet.  I've had the pleasure of seeing a few of his shows, and highly recommend them.