Tall Fiddler, released in 2019 on Compass (7 4737-2), is Michael Cleveland's Grammy-winning album for Best Bluegrass Album at the 2020 ceremony. The session pulls together a who's-who of acoustic-music elders alongside Cleveland's own band — Tommy Emmanuel, Béla Fleck, Del McCoury, Tim O'Brien, Sam Bush, Jerry Douglas, Dan Tyminski, and the Travelin' McCourys, with vocalist Josh Richards anchoring most of the singing alongside Cleveland's fiddle. The arrangements cross genre lines from hard bluegrass into jam-grass and folk. The title cut is a Cleveland and Emmanuel call-and-response duel, and Cleveland co-wrote a Memphis-rock tune with Fleck about stealing one of Elvis's Cadillacs — a marker of the album's stylistic reach beyond pure bluegrass tradition.
Tracklist
- 1 Arkansas 2:35
- 2 That High Lonesome Sound alt version 3:40
- 3 20 Cent Cotton and 90 Cent Meat 3:32
- 4 Beauty of My Dreams alt version 2:36
- 5 5-String Swing 3:26
- 6 Old Time River Man alt version 4:53
- 7 Tennessee Plates 3:29
- 8 Tall Fiddler 3:14
- 9 Tarnation 5:56
- 10 Son of a Ramblin' Man 3:07
- 11 Mountain Heartache 3:45
- 12 Me And Helen 3:56
- 13 Lazy Katie 3:20