For singer Alison Krauss, bluegrass is a lifestyle

Alison Krauss has won 27 Grammys over the course of her 30-year recording career -- the most ever for a woman and second most of all time. Her 2007 collaboration with Led Zeppelin’s Robert Plant earned five of those awards, including Album of the Year.

For Krauss, bluegrass is more than just a music genre.

“It’s a real lifestyle, it’s a mindset, people who love bluegrass and roots music. I think they’re all drawn and connected to the past in a simpler, sweet way of life,” Krauss told “CBS This Morning: Saturday” co-host host Anthony Mason at the Gibson Showroom in New York.

Its power is “basic human connection,” she said.

“It’s always about holding on to where you came from and admiring that and the land, family, God and home. The most beautiful girl always lived next door. It’s a very sweet, strong value system,” she said.

Krauss started going to fiddle contests and bluegrass festivals as a girl growing up in Illinois.

“So I was always around this kind of music,” Krauss said.

“And did you know you wanted to do it?” Mason asked.

“I really started to love it when I started singing and the harmonies were really fascinating to me, getting to do that. I just couldn’t get enough of that. And the banjo was huge. People who get attracted to that sound, they freak out. And I was one of them,” Krauss said.

She was 16 when she released her debut solo album in 1987. Soon after, she teamed up with the band Union Station. 

For “Windy City,” her first solo album in almost 18 years, Krauss connected with renowned Nashville songwriter and producer Buddy Cannon, who’s worked with George Jones, Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard.

“His nickname is ‘Ears.’ And what I loved about that was that in a town full of musical geniuses, Buddy’s the one who got that title. I thought that was so great,” Krauss said.

In the end she went after a very particular kind of song.

“The only thing we talked about was wanting songs that were older than me,” Krauss said. “There’s a real romance with things that are outside of your own generation because you kind of make up what it was like because you didn’t have it firsthand... You really end up finishing the story.”

“I love how the record is, it’s songs of loss, but it’s not weak,” Krauss said. “It’s almost like you don’t know it’s sad. I loved the way it turned out.”