Somewhere between the Stanley Brothers and Leftover Salmon, a little to the left of the Po' Ramblin' Boys and The Kody Norris Show, modern bluegrass nods to its past with, if graded on the political spectrum, what would be judged a center-right approach. It's usually called, relatively speaking, "traditional." In fact it's a fusion of old and new in nearly equal measure, a bit more of the former than of the latter, but it's a music that at one time would have been considered progressive.

I started hearing bluegrass as a teenager, when Flatt & Scruggs were played -- as incredible as it may seem when many (including me) think of bluegrass as, at loose definition, a growingly distant relative of country -- on mainstream, Nashville-driven radio. (An aside: I am well aware that a rising independent-country movement is challenging the dreary, formulaic fare that pollutes your ears when you turn on your car radio. While some of the artists are bluegrass fans, they aren't performing bluegrass.) Though Bill Monroe invented the music as a logical departure from the oldtime string bands he grew up with, bluegrass -- then a radical innovation -- would not have survived if it had remained a static moment in Monroe's imagination.

So artists like Daniel Grindstaff and Wilson Banjo Co. are not so much traditionalists as neo-traditionalists, maintaining the core of the music while putting a fresh energy on top of it.

Grindstaff, whose career began in his teens when he accompanied the revered duo Jim & Jesse McReynolds, has released the sturdy Heroes & Friends whose songlist stretches from venerable American folk songs and pre-rock pop tunes to mid-century country hits to Bob Dylan's "Forever Young." The last of these, which I've disliked from first hearing, is rendered so listenable that at initial exposure to a pleasingly distinctive arrangement with Dolly Parton and Paul Brewster in tow, I wondered momentarily if this was the "Forever Young" of unhappy acquaintance.

A range of bluegrass and country notables join Grindstaff, who clearly has many friends in the business, for 10 judiciously chosen songs, sung by Grindstaff whose talents include an expressive voice and a banjo style as soulful as anybody's currently on the scene. The album underscores what comes of the confluence of deep talent and long experience.

I have reviewed two earlier Wilson Banjo Co. albums in this space. As I related there, the band's name is owed to a South Carolina-based business that manufactures specialty banjos. The founder, musician Steve Wilson, created it as an advertising device to showcase what his banjos sound like in the hands of modern masters. Happily, the results were so warmly received that a group by the name, with a host of mostly guest members passing through, has become a fixture on the scene. Memory Lane pushes its predecessors' virtues forward, reworking a sound that will appeal to both longtime bluegrassers and those just getting acquainted.

Those who have heard this outfit before will be pleased that vocalist and fiddler Sarah Logan is back. For a taste of Logan at her most chillingly Appalachian (a thick coat is advised), I recommend "The Holler," written by Jordan Rainer & Bill Packard. In a very different mood, Logan's singing leads the sexy -- yes, bluegrass sex -- "Coalmine" (Richie McDonald/Ron Harbin/Roxie Dean), in which drums appear to particularly joyous effect. By the way, "Coalmine" doesn't mean what you think it means.

WBC is to be commended once more for the quality of its material. As often as not, songs and instrumentals on bluegrass recordings function only as the foundation on which to show off picking skills. The melodies and lyrics feel pro forma, likewise the narratives themselves. The most appealing material is sometimes, or often, taken from the foundational repertoire, from the late 1940s through the 1960s. They're given a fresh arrangement, true, but one has the impression that what matters is how it's played, not what's played. The weakest part of bluegrass has always been precisely this, at least if you think a good song is a good story set to music. Most people do.

A medley on the penultimate cut pays loving tribute to Carter Stanley's "Our Last Goodbye" and Bill Monroe's "Walk Softly on This Heart of Mine," two classics worth honoring. All the same, I'm pleased to report I don't recognize anything else, or even the names of the writers. I concede that while I know a fair amount about bluegrass, that knowledge is not encyclopedic and is shakiest where modern-day acts are concerned. Still, these are old-shoe, in-the-tradition numbers, nonetheless composed creatively and as cliche-free as bluegrass circumstances permit.