Ran across this when I asked Pandora for “Iranian Traditional Music”. So apparently Pandora didn’t have much of that, but it tried at least, and Kronos Quartet’s Floodplain album does have some Middle-Eastern flavored tracks. One of the things I love about the album is how the pieces combine the exotic sounds of world folk music into richly-composed works. This isn’t the sort of wallpaper you sometimes get with folk or popular styles; it’s full-fledged art music that explores non-Western idioms. Some of my favorite tracks are “Nihavent Sirto” by Tanburi Cemil Bey and “Mugam Beyati Shiraz” by Rahman Asadollahi.