Alison Krauss helped bring bluegrass to a new audience in the ’90s. Blending bluegrass with folk, Krauss was instantly acclaimed from the start of her career, but it wasn’t until her platinum-selling 1995 compilation Now That I’ve Found You that she became a mainstream star. Between her 1987 debut Too Late to Cry and Now That I’ve Found You, she matured from a child prodigy to a versatile, ambitious, and diverse musician and, in the process, made some of the freshest bluegrass of the late ’80s and early ’90s.
When she was five years old, Krauss started performing the violin, taking classical lessons. She soon tired of the regiments of classical performing and started playing country and bluegrass licks. At the age of eight, she began entering talent contests in and around her native Champaign, IL. Two years later, she had her own ensemble. In 1983, when she was 12 years old, she won the Illinois State Fiddle Championship and the Society for the Preservation of Bluegrass in America named her the Most Promising Fiddler in the Midwest. In 1985, Krauss made her recording debut on an album, performing on a album made by her brother Viktor, Jim Hoiles, and Bruce Weiss. The album was called Different Strokes and appeared on the independent Fiddle Tunes label. Later that year, she signed to Rounder Records. She was 14 years old at the time.
Too Late to Cry, Krauss’ debut album, appeared in 1987 to very positive reviews. The record was recorded with Krauss’ backup band, the Union Station, which featured guitar player Jeff White, banjoist Alison Brown, and bassist Viktor Krauss; the following year, the lineup won the Society for the Preservation of Bluegrass in America’s national group Championship contest. In 1989, Krauss and Union Station put forth Two Highways, which was nominated for the Grammy Award for Best Bluegrass Recording. Although the record didn’t win the award, her next album, 1990’s I’ve Got That Old Feeling, did. The success of I’ve Got That Old Feeling was unprecedented for bluegrass acts in the ’80s and it laid the groundwork for Krauss’ breakthrough in the ’90s. By this time, Union Station’s band had more or less settled. It now featured mandolinist Adam Steffey, banjoist/guitarist Ron Block, bass player Barry Bales, and guitarist Tim Stafford; Stafford later left the group and was replaced by Dan Tyminski.
In 1992, Alison Krauss & Union Station put forth Every Time You Say Goodbye, which featured a typically eclectic array of material. The album appeared in the country charts and Krauss’ videos were shown on Country material tv. I Know Who Holds Tomorrow was released in 1994 and was even more successful. But it was the 1995 compilation Now That I’ve Found You: A Collection that made Krauss a star. The record reached number two on the country charts and — even more remarkably — went into the pop Top Ten and sold over a million copies. Its success confirmed her reputation as bluegrass’ leading light in the ’90s.
Krauss & Union Station followed the unexpected success of Now That I’ve Found You with So Long, So Wrong in spring 1997. Forget About It came in mid-1999. A year later, Krauss & Union Station joined the likes of John Hartford, Ralph Stanley, and others for the multi-million-selling soundtrack O Brother, Where Art Thou? A North American tour encompassing some of the album’s stellar musicians followed in summer 2002, allowing Krauss and her band’s popularity to soar. New Favorite appeared in November and went gold within four months. A live record came soon after, and in 2004 Krauss put forth Lonely Runs Both Ways. A Hundred Miles or More, a collection drawn from Krauss’ Rounder albums, along with sides recorded for assorted soundtrack projects and five previously fresh new tracks, appeared in 2007.
