Alison Krauss & Union Station - Live is a marvelous live album with some of the production values I have ever heard. Each track has a terrific warmth and richness.

The two-CD set combines the soft floating voice of Alison with the hard-driving bluegrass of a talented collection of musicians to provide a high level of entertainment, especially as morning or evening drive time listening in the car.

Ms. Krauss' voice is used to wonderful advantage in such tracks as "Let Me Touch You for Awhile," "The Lucky One," "Forget About It," "There is a Reason," and many others. One of my favorites is the plaintive "Ghost in this House." By the same token, the bluegrass instrumentals such as "Choctaw Hayride" and "Cluck Old Hen" can best be described as quintessential country-car-chase tunes.

For those who have never had the pleasure of listening either to Ms. Krauss or to bluegrass, this album is an excellent introduction to both and is an essential recording in every respect.

I have heard Alison Krauss and Union Station piecemeal over a period of years on the weekly KUNM-FM radio program "Folk Routes," and jumped at the chance to pick up this live, 2-CD set. Live sets often are a gamble sound quality wise, but I was pleasantly surprised (estactic is the right word) with "Alison Krauss + Union Station Live." Alison shines on both vocals and fiddle, examples of the former on songs such as "Baby, Now That I've Found You," and the latter on the rolicking, crowd-pleasing instrumental "Cluck Old Hen." Jerry Douglas's dobro is a strongpoint of both the band and this performance. Dan Tyminski takes over lead vocals on another of many highlights of this set, "The Boy Who Wouldn't Hoe Corn," with a long dobro lead-in by Jerry. And, of course, the real crowd pleaser on this set is Tyminski (lead vocals), Jerry, Ron Block and Barry Bales reprising their work on the "Oh Brother, Where Art Thou" soundtrack foundation, "I am a Man of Constant Sorrow." For me, another gem on this set carried over from the "Oh Brother" soundtrack is Alison, Dan, Ron and Barry soaring rendition of "Down to the River to Pray." This incredible CD -- a great value -- continues to see heavy rotation in my CD players.

You've probably heard this a thousand times, but if you like bluegrass, and you liked the soundtrack to "O Brother Where Art Thou," you MUST pick up this live double-cd. The sound quality is ultimate perfection, no annoying audience noise during the songs, the musicianship is immaculate, the melodies are beautiful, and the harmonies are utterly fantastic. The music will make your heart pound, it even may bring a tear to your eye...I kid you not. Alison Krauss' voice is angelic, and Union Station's music and harmonies just create this unbelievable wall of sound. It's truly a gorgeous cd. Some of my favorite songs on here are Choctaw Hayride, Cluck Old Hen, Everytime You Say Goodbye, and Forget About It, Stay, Take Me For Longing and A Tribute to Peador O'Donnell--outstanding dobro work. But really this whole double-cd is great and I always listen to it all the way through. It cheers me up, makes the day seem a little brighter. I'm not exaggerating here. Buy it for yourself. Buy it for your friend. Buy it for your folks.

There is something wonderful about a live CD and I love AKUS, so I knew I was in for a treat when this double disc set came out. I have not been disappointed, especially since disc one and disc two are equally great!

Alison Krauss and Dan Tyminski swap lead vocal duties, when they are not leading the rest of Union Station through the rollicking instrumentals. My favorite songs are "Just Let Me Touch You For A While", "Maybe" (Krauss' voice soars), the playful "Oh Atlanta" and the borderline depressing "New Favorite". The crowd comes into play heavily - they eat up "I am a Man of Constant Sorrow". At one point a heckler yells 'more' and Dan says 'this is not a race' - showing AKUS' not often seen playful side.

For two CDs, the price is right and it is a wonderful mixture of old and new AKUS music, along with some bluegrass standards not appearing on any of their other CDs. Truly a must-have set!

O.K., I'm a big fan and I was expecting this two c/d set to be very good, but this exceeds my expectations in several ways. Ist of all the sound quality is perfect - I mean flawless - 5 stars. The Song selection is also 5 stars both for quality and quantity, and with 25 songs on 2 c/d's this is a real deal. I also like the fact that there's not a lot of talk - this is 99.9% music without a lot of kidding around. I was glad to see the band cut up a little on the TV concert - that was fun, but this live set is music, music, music. The variety of songs is 5 stars also - plenty of pop for the folks who love ballads and plenty of bluegrass for the purists. "But You Know I Love You" the old kenny Rogers & 1st Edition song is wonderful and the closing song, Ron's "There is a Reason" is such a sweet song for these times. A great introduction for new fans and a real treasure for the old ones. I saw them on the New Favorite tour (Mobile) and they were great, but the Louisville shows must have been a peak performance for the band. I grew up in 1960's loving the Beatles, Beach Boys, Stones, Who, Rundgren, America etc. so I'm not really a bluegrass person, but I've got to say that this is about as good as music gets these days, folks.