The phrase "cowboy songs" is not self-explanatory. In the original definition these were grassroots songs that working cowboys adapted -- often from Irish models, since many 19th-century drovers were immigrants from there -- or made up. Some were later collected by John Lomax and lesser-known folksong preservationists. Or they can be pop tunes from the extinct genre of singing-cowboy movies that Hollywood ground out in the 1930s and '40s, associated with Sons of the Pioneers ("Cool Water," "Tumblin' Tumbleweeds") and comparable groups, whose depiction of Western life usually had little to do with any experienced reality then or now.

The Rifters, who smartly integrate the two styles, are a trio of older men, all experienced in ranch life and based in northern New Mexico. The material on The Enchanted World celebrates the region's landscape and the people who live on it. The songs sometimes speak to an image of the natural world that transcends Victorian cliches and addresses -- from what many listeners, including me, may see as an enlightened perspective -- issues of land use and conservation.

The production is spare and acoustic, serving the Rifters' mostly low-key, melodic approach, which encompasses both originals and covers, including a couple of standards ("That Lucky Old Sun," a 1949 hit for Frankie Laine, and John Hartford's "Gentle on My Mind") ostensibly unrelated to range sounds. Speaking strictly for myself, I wish the guys had used this space for a couple of authentic cowboy numbers, which are absent from the present lineup. But of course it's their decision.

On the other hand, the clear model for a portion of these songs is the work of the late Ian Tyson, who saw himself as a link between our time and the earlier Western-ballad tradition. Sometimes the vocals here even sound like Tyson's, or at least a kind of Tyson-lite. Nothing wrong with that, of course. As inspiration goes, one could do far worse.

The Rifters, who represent modern Western music with sincerity and honor, do it the right way, with lyrics, tunes and harmonies meant to celebrate a particular place and to encase it in the listener's memory. The Enchanted World succeeds.