“The Goat Rodeo Sessions” is a collaborative CD featuring Yo-Yo Ma, Stuart Duncan, Edgar Meyer & Chris Thile. They are superstars in classical music and are very well known as masters of their instruments. Yo-Yo Ma plays the cello, while Stuart Duncan works the fiddle, as Edgar Meyer does the bass and Chris Thile is on the mandolin. This is their first time working together and they do not disappoint.

I can honestly say that I am not a big fan of classical music, but this CD appealed to me for different reasons. I had a lot of doubts before listening to this CD and didn’t think it would work out, but I was proven wrong. These are 4 really talented guys that mixed their classical styles with a bit of jazz, funk, folk, and even some Chinese opera. The songs were calming and exciting at the same time. My favorite songs were “Quarter Chicken Dark” and “Where’s my Bow?” They did a great job of telling stories by only using their instruments and painted so many picture s in my mind.

The gripes I did have with the CD were the songs with vocals and the song length for some tracks. The instrumentals were good enough on their own and the songs that did include vocals (“Here and Heaven” and “No one but You”) were not well done and could have been left out. The vocals did not fit in with the theme of the album and did not add any extra value to the songs. Also, even though I liked most of the songs, I was not happy with how they tried to prolong some songs on the CD. When they could have cut it short and got their point across, some songs felt like they dragged on and slowed the pace of the CD.

Overall, I was happy with this CD, but would recommend the minor improvements mentioned on the previous paragraph. I would recommend this CD to my older friends and family, but it was not really my genre of choice to begin with. The talent is properly showcased and the CD well thought out for the most part. For those reasons, I am giving this CD a “B-.”