Uncommon Ritual is the second album released by Sony Classical

Sony Classical Records

Sony Classical Records was started in 1927 as Columbia Masterworks Records, a subsidiary of the American Columbia Records. In 1948, it issued the first commercially successful long-playing 12" record...

 of string trios, following Appalachia Waltz

Appalachia Waltz

Appalachia Waltz is the first album from the trio of fiddler and composer Mark O'Connor, double-bassist and composer Edgar Meyer, and cellist Yo-Yo Ma. Sony Classical released the disc in 1996. The album announces a new kind of Americana-styled Western art music, with ancestry in old-timey,...

, with unusual instrumentation and influences from bluegrass

Bluegrass music

Bluegrass music is a form of American roots music, and a sub-genre of country music. It has mixed roots in Scottish, English, Welsh and Irish traditional music...

 and folk music

Folk music

Folk music is an English term encompassing both traditional folk music and contemporary folk music. The term originated in the 19th century. Traditional folk music has been defined in several ways: as music transmitted by mouth, as music of the lower classes, and as music with unknown composers....

 to create an Americana-style of traditional classical music. Uncommon Ritual adds jazz

Jazz

Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...

, blues

Blues

Blues is the name given to both a musical form and a music genre that originated in African-American communities of primarily the "Deep South" of the United States at the end of the 19th century from spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts and chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads...

, and elements from world music

World music

World music is a term with widely varying definitions, often encompassing music which is primarily identified as another genre. This is evidenced by world music definitions such as "all of the music in the world" or "somebody else's local music"...

 to the mix. The trio includes double-bassist and composer Edgar Meyer

Edgar Meyer

Edgar Meyer is a prominent contemporary bassist and composer. His styles include classical, bluegrass, newgrass, and jazz. Meyer has worked as a session musician in Nashville, part of various chamber groups, a composer, and an arranger...

, banjoist and composer Béla Fleck

Béla Fleck

Béla Anton Leoš Fleck is an American banjo player. Widely acknowledged as one of the world's most innovative and technically proficient banjo players, he is best known for his work with the bands New Grass Revival and Béla Fleck and the Flecktones.-Early life and career details:Fleck was born in...

, and mandolin player Mike Marshall.

Track listing

1. "Uncommon Ritual" (Edgar Meyer)
2. "Seesaw" (Béla Fleck)
3. "Sliding Down" (Meyer)
4. "Chromium Picolinate" (Meyer, Fleck)
5. "Contramonkey" (Meyer)
6. "Change Meeting" (Meyer)
7. "Zigeunerweisen" (Pablo de Sarasate - arr:Mike Marshall, Meyer)
8. "Travis" (Fleck)
9. "Old Tyme" (Meyer)
10. Contrapunctus XIII from The Art of the Fugue (Johann Sebastian Bach - arr:Fleck, Marshall, Meyer)
11. Third movement from Amalgamations for solo bass (Meyer)
12. "By the River" (Meyer)
13. "Big Country" (Fleck)
14. "Barnyard Disturbance" (Meyer)
15. "In the Garden" (Meyer)
16. "Child's Play" (Marshall)
17. "The Big Cheese" (Fleck, Marshall, Meyer)

Personnel

• Edgar Meyer, bass
  Double bass
  The double bass, also called the string bass, upright bass, standup bass or contrabass, is the largest and lowest-pitched bowed string instrument in the modern symphony orchestra, with strings usually tuned to E1, A1, D2 and G2...
  
  ; piano
  Piano
  The piano is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It is one of the most popular instruments in the world. Widely used in classical and jazz music for solo performances, ensemble use, chamber music and accompaniment, the piano is also very popular as an aid to composing and rehearsal...
  
   and mandocello
  Mandocello
  The mandocello is a plucked string instrument of the mandolin family. It has eight strings in four paired courses, tuned in 5ths like a mandolin, but is larger, and tuned CC-GG-dd-aa . It is to the mandolin what the cello is to the violin.-Construction:Mandocello construction is similar to the...
  
   on "Sliding Down"
• Béla Fleck, banjo
  Banjo
  In the 1830s Sweeney became the first white man to play the banjo on stage. His version of the instrument replaced the gourd with a drum-like sound box and included four full-length strings alongside a short fifth-string. There is no proof, however, that Sweeney invented either innovation. This new...
  
  ; mandolin
  Mandolin
  A mandolin is a musical instrument in the lute family . It descends from the mandore, a soprano member of the lute family. The mandolin soundboard comes in many shapes—but generally round or teardrop-shaped, sometimes with scrolls or other projections. A mandolin may have f-holes, or a single...
  
   on "Sliding Down"; guitar
  Guitar
  The guitar is a plucked string instrument, usually played with fingers or a pick. The guitar consists of a body with a rigid neck to which the strings, generally six in number, are attached. Guitars are traditionally constructed of various woods and strung with animal gut or, more recently, with...
  
   on "Sliding Down", "Travis", and "By the River"
• Mike Marshall, mandolin; mandocello on "Uncommon Ritual" and "Travis"; mandola
  Mandola
  The mandola or tenor mandola is a fretted, stringed musical instrument. It is to the mandolin what the viola is to the violin: the four double courses of strings tuned in fifths to the same pitches as the viola , a fifth lower than a mandolin...
  
  on "Sliding Down", "Travis", and "In the Garden"; guitar on "Sliding Down" and "Big Country"