At the Grammys this year, Alison Krauss and Robert Plant received lots of love. The pair cleaned up at the awards ceremony, taking five prizes home.

For “Please Read the Letter” the duo won Record of the Year. Their collaborative set “Raising Sand” won Album of the Year. For “Rich Woman” the two won for Best Pop Collaboration with Vocals and “Killing the Blues” won Best Country Collaboration with Vocals. “Raising Sand” also won Best Contemporary Folk/Americana Album. Their pair was very nonchalant over their wins.

Plant said it’s very different forty years after coming to this town. This is fantastic.

Dressed in outfits inspired by Sgt. Pepper, Coldplay also cleaned up. They won a total of three Grammys. For “Viva La Vida” they won Best Pop Performance By a Duo or Group with Vocals and Song of the Year. For their set “Viva La Vida or Death and All His Friends” they won Best Rock Album. Lil Wayne also won three Grammys. For “A Milli” he won Best Rap Solo Performance, for “Lollipop” Best Rap Song and for “Tha Carter III” Best Rap Album.

The performers winning two Grammys included John Corigliano, James Conlon, Peter Gabriel, Kirk Franklin, Sugarland, Brad Paisley, Al Green, Ne-Yo, John Mayer, Daft Punk and Adele.

Jennifer Nettles of Sugarland said during her acceptance speech, I said I would be cool. Coldplay and Paul McCartney are here. But I really am not feeling cool.

In a very poignant moment, Jennifer Hudson won her first Grammy for Best R&B Album. Hudson’s mother, nephew and brother were recently murdered. She held the award up and said, I don’t know what I want to say. Whitney Houston is my presenter. Thank God for bringing me through. Thank you to my family that is in heaven and also to those here today.

Shortly after, comedy relief was provided by Dwayne Johnson, who made cracks about the community service plan of Kid Rock and kissing Katy Perry.

However, scandal marred the awards ceremony. Chris Brown, Grammy nominee and R&B singer, was charged with a felony for domestic violence. He turned himself in later to the police. The police, as part of standard practice, did not identify who the victim was. However Rihanna, Brown’s girlfriend, canceled her performance and appearance at the Grammy. Her performance spot at the Grammys was filled by a “Let’s Stay Together” performance with Al Green, Keith Urban, Boyz II Men and Justin Timberlake.

The performances and collaboration at this year’s 51st annual Grammy awards were very strong. The show was kicked off by U2 performing “Get On Your Boots,” their new single. A New Orleans tribute was performed by Allen Sainthood and Lil Wayne. “Sweet Caroline” was sung by Neil Diamond. Other performances included a Four Tops tribute, Coldplay and Jay-Z, Radiohead performing with the marching band from University of Southern California, and an emotional performance by Jennifer Hudson of “You Pulled Me Through.” One of the night’s strongest performances was an unlikely pair of the Jonas Brothers and Stevie Wonder on vocoder and keyboard for “Superstitious.”

Another unlikely occurrence was when Blink-182, after warring in the media, arrive on the stage at the Grammys to announce their reunion.

Travis Barker, the drummer for the band who last year survived a plane crash said, we have played all this music together. We have made the decision we will play together again.

On Thursday night September 18 Robert Plant and Alison Krauss took top honors home from the 7th Annual Americana Music Association Honors and Awards show held in Ryman Auditorium in Nashville. Plant and Krauss were at the event and accepted the awards Duo/Group of the Year and Album of the Year for their collaborative album “Raising Sand.”

Artist of the Year honors went to Levon Helm. Jerry Garcia, John Hiatt and Joan Baez were awarded lifetime achievement honors. Buddy Miller was name Instrumentalist of the Year, while Mike Farris was recognized as New Emerging Artist of the Year. Song of the Year honors went to Brian Keane and Hayes Carll for “She Left Me For Jesus.”

The “Raising Sand” tour of Alison Krauss and Robert Plant has been extended, with shows from the unconventional duo extending well into the fall.

Krauss and Plant continue on the North American tour’s current leg on July 14 with a show in Toronto. Nine additional new shows have been added for September and October. They will kick off in Kansas City on September 23.

Once again the two will have a full band backing them, led by T Bone Burnett, the producer of “Raising Sand.” Krauss and Plant will be performing selections from the collaborative album as well as material from each of their musical catalogs.

“Raising Sand” was released last October, debuting in the No. 2 spot on Billboard’s 200 album chart. The hit single “Gone Gone Gone” was spawned from the set and earned Krauss and Plant a Grammy in February for Best Pop Collaboration with Vocals.

The duo in June received three Americana Music Association award nominations: for their single “Gone Gone Gone” they were nominated for Song of the Year, “Raising Sand” was nominated as Album of the Year, and Plant and Krauss were also nominated for Duo/Group of the year. Winners will be announced at the 7th annual AMA awards ceremony to be held in Nashville on September 18.

Last December Plant along with John Paul Jones and Jimmy Page, surviving Led Zeppelin former band mates, performed a one time reunion show in London. It was a tribute for Ahmet Ertegun, the late founder of Atlantic Records. Much Music, the Canadian music network, reported in May that they band would be announcing four more reunion dates for Toronto shortly. However management for the group denied the rumor very quickly.

Grammy winners Alison Krauss and Robert Plant, one month after they revealed plans for several April concerts for the South, have unveiled a full spring-summer tour of the US to back “Raising Sand,” their joint album.

The April engagements for the duo will be followed with a month long run of shows in the US, kicking off in Virginia on June 2. The pair will be visiting around twenty cities across the country.

A second Louisville, KY performance has been added to Krauss and Plant’s April schedule, pushing the launch date for the tour up a day early to April 19. The two will also be performing on April 25 at New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival.

In between the two US runs, Plant and Krauss will be performing 11 dates in the UK and Europe. Overseas dates are posted on the Plant/Krauss official website.

According to organizers, the US shows just announced will go on sale on March 3.

Krauss and Plant will be backed by a T Bone Burnett led full band. Burnett also produced “Raising Sand.” Krauss and Plant will be performing selections from their album, as well as material from the two performers catalogs.

Last October “Raising Sand” was released and debuted on Billboard’s 200 chart at No. 2. “Gone Gone Gone” was spawned from the set and earned Krauss and Plant a Grammy earlier this month in the category Best Pop Collaboration with Vocals.

Country Music Television on April 11 will be airing a preview of the upcoming tour of Krauss and Plant. The special is called “CMT Crossroads: Robert Plant and Alison Krauss.” The special will feature several song performances from the album “Raising Sand.”

If you know Robert Plant mainly as a primal screamer on Led Zeppelin classic tunes like “Whole Lotta Love” and “The Immigrant Song” you might be surprised to hear he has joined forces with Alison Krauss, the bluegrass star.

However, Zeppelin was more than bombast. There were songs like “That’s The Way” for each “Black Dog,” and “Gallows Pole” for “Rock and Roll.” The musical roots of Plants are with folk, blues and country as much as with heavy metal and rock and roll. Plant, who always likes to experiment and a Krauss fan, called Alison several years ago to tell her he would like to work with her. However, it wasn’t until after they sang a Leadbelly tribute duet together at a Rock and Roll Hall of Fame ceremony that they seriously considered making an album together.

“Raising Sand,” the resulting album, contains songs chosen by producer T Bone Burnett, with Krauss and Plant input. The set is a diverse mixture of roots rock, folk, country and blues from a wide array of composers, including Sam Phillips, Mel Tillis, Little Milton Campbell, Don and Phil Everly, Gene Clark and Tom Waits.

The combination is very successful. On several songs Krauss and Plant share lead vocals, including “Gone Gone Gone” from the Everly Brothers, “Rich Woman,” and “Stick With Me Baby,” the Mel Tillis song that brims with optimism and hope from a couple who, against all odds, are in love.

The albums’ solo tracks are also very effective. The haunting takes by Krauss on “Sister Rosetta Goes Before Us” by Phillips and “Trample Rose” by Kathleen Brennan and Tom Waits are some of the best highlights from the set. The emotion readings from Plant of “Polly Come Home” by Clark and “Nothin” from Townes Van Zandt are two of the other highlights. The musical worlds of Krauss and Plant collide on “Nothin,” with country fiddles playing above the Zeppelinesque guitars.

There’s even Plant covering himself on “Please Read the Letter,” a tune from his 1998 album “Walking into Clarksdale” done with Jimmy Page. The breakup song is offered a woman’s perspective with the harmonies from Krauss. It feels like the two of them are reading from the same letter.

“Raising Sand” with a crack band backing Plant and Krauss, including Norman Bake, Marc Ribot, Jay Bellerose, Mike Seeger and Dennis Crouch, the set sounds new and familiar all at once. Krauss and Plant, who in their own rights are two forces, combine to offer something exciting and fresh. There are rumors that the two will be going on tour. The possibility that Krauss and Plant will be offering reinterpretations of one another’s catalogs makes for very intriguing possibilities. It could ever well be 2008′s must see tour.

Robert Plant, the rock legend, and Alison Krauss, bluegrass songwriter and singer, have announced a release date of October 23 for “Raising Sand,” the pair’s new studio album.

A recent press release reported that the likely collaboration evolved after Plant, former frontman for Led Zeppelin, called Krauss, the bluegrass star, around seven years ago, telling her that he really admired her music and would someday like to work with her. The first time the two sang together was during an induction ceremony for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in a tribute to Leadbelly. T-Bone Burnett, the producer, was enlisted eventually to help them make a recording together.

In a recent press statement Burnett explained that the two singers worked on their material at the home of Krauss in Nashville before going into the studio and recording with an entire band. Burnett said, I want to take them out of their comfort zones.

The studio sessions resulted in a 13 track album, “Raising Sand,” covering a wide array of musical genres, including folk, country, blue and R&B. A full band fronted the studio effort, including Marc Robot, guitarist, Dennis Crouch, bassist, Jay Bellerose, drummer, and augmented by Norman Blake, guitarist, and Mike Seeger, multi-instrumentalist.

Burnett said, these are two singers who are storytellers and are able to handle a wide array of material. So we looked for stories.

Plant said through a written statement that around seventy percent through I started to realize that we had created something I would have never dreamt of.

Krauss added, the contrast brings so much romance. The experience was truly life changing.

Robert Plant, the legendary rock singer, has added some new dates for his current North American tour . The trek supports “Mighty Rearranger,” the first set with all new material from Plant in over a decade.

After the current U.S. run for Plant completes in Los Angeles on July 24, he will be playing a few concerts in Europe and then head back to North America to perform in Ottawa, Ontario on September 10. The new leg for Plant’s tour will make its way through Canada and then visit several U.S. cities in the North and Southwest. Once he wraps up his touring in the US, Plant will be gearing up to do a long tour of Europe later in the year. The European itinerary for Plant is listed on his website.

Strange Sensation is backing the new album. The band was established in 2001 by Plant and consists of drummer Clive Deamer (Roni Size, Portishead), Fuzz Against Junk’s Billy Fuller and John Baggott (Massive Attack, Portishead) on bass, and Justin Adams, the multi-instrumentalist, who has also played with Sinead O’Connor. The band first appeared with Plant on his 2002 album “Dreamland,” which received a Grammy nomination.

According to a recent press release, last year Plant and the band recorded and wrote the new album in Solsbury, Hill and Snowdonia, UK.

Adams from Strange Sensation in a statement said we’re a strange group of characters. Things are always idiosyncratic. We do things in non standard ways. Robert is very interesting to work with, always encouraging the individual styles of people. He’s happy when I bring North African rhythms in that are unfamiliar or John introducing weird electronic sounds. Now days that doesn’t happen too often. Usually there’s one guy with his computer, not like during the 1960s and 1970s when people were out there inventing new kinds of music and breaking rules. In some anarchic and weird ways we are closer in spirit to that.

Robert Plant is going on a tour of North America early this summer in support of his new set featuring all new material for the first time in over ten years.

The trek, consisting mainly of small shed and theater shows, will kick off in mid June in the Northeast and is scheduled to end in Los Angeles in late July.

The tour will be getting underway approximately a month following the release on May 10 of “Mighty Rearranger,” the latest set from Led Zeppelin’s former frontman. The album features “Shine It All Around.”

Strange Sensation is backing the new set of Plant’s. In 2001 the band was established by Plant and covered “Dreamland,” the rock legend’s 2002 Grammy nominated album. Members of Strange Sensation include Clive Deamer, drummer from Roni Size and Portishead, bassists Billy Fuller from Fuzz Against Junk and John Baggott of Massive Attack and Portishead, Skin, Cast guitarist, and Justin Adams, the multi-instrumentalist.

Last year Plant and Strange Sensation composed and recorded the new set from Solsbury Hill and Snowdonia in the UK.

In a recent statement Adams wrote, we’re a strange cast of characters and do things in very nonstandard ways. Things are always quite idiosyncratic. It’s very interesting working with Robert. He always encourages people with their individual styles. When John introduces in weird electronic sounds or I bring new rhythms from North Africa, he welcomes it. Today that doesn’t happen too much. Usually one guy does it all on his computer. Back in the 1960s and 1970s there were people who broke rules and invented new types of music. In a lot of ways our spirit is a lot closer to those anarchic and weird times.