Sleep with One Eye Open is the first album by mandolinist Chris Thile and guitarist Michael Daves as a duo. Nonesuch released it on 10 May 2011. The two had met at a bluegrass jam in Manhattan in 2005 and were playing regularly at Rockwood Music Hall in New York before they made the record. They recorded in January 2011 at Third Man Studios in Nashville, live to tape over four days. Thile plays mandolin and Daves guitar, both sing, and the two share the producer credit.
The sixteen tracks draw on material associated with the Monroe Brothers, the Louvin Brothers, Jimmy Martin and Flatt & Scruggs. Bill Monroe is credited as the writer of “Tennessee Blues” and “Mississippi Waltz,” and Lester Flatt as the writer of “My Little Girl in Tennessee” and the title song, with Flatt and Earl Scruggs sharing credit for “If I Should Wander Back Tonight.” Other credits include Jimmy C. Newman and Jay D. Miller for “Cry, Cry Darlin’,” Joe Allison and Milton Estes for “20/20 Vision,” and Harlan Howard and Freddie Hart for “It Takes One to Know One.” “Rabbit in the Log,” “Rain and Snow,” “Bury Me Beneath the Willow” and “Roll in My Sweet Baby’s Arms” are credited as traditional, and “Billy in the Lowground” and “Ookpik Waltz” are instrumentals. The album opens with “Rabbit in the Log.”
Tracklist
- 1 Rabbit in the Log alt version 2:39
- 2 Cry Cry Darling alt version 3:02
- 3 Loneliness and Desperation alt version 2:25
- 4 Tennessee Blues alt version 4:04
- 5 20-20 Vision alt version 3:13
- 6 You're Running Wild 2:33
- 7 Ookpik Waltz alt version 4:06
- 8 My Little Girl in Tennessee alt version 2:49
- 9 Sleep with One Eye Open 3:16
- 10 Rain and Snow alt version 3:31
- 11 Mississippi Waltz alt version 2:46
- 12 Bury Me Beneath the Willow alt version 3:46
- 13 Roll in My Sweet Baby’s Arms alt version 3:09
- 14 Billy in the Lowground 3:14
- 15 It Takes One to Know One alt version 3:15
- 16 If I Should Wander Back Tonight alt version 3:48
