For more than a decade, Kronos Quartet has championed the dramatic and deeply passionate work of Azerbaijani composer and pianist Franghiz Ali-Zadeh. This maverick artist defied the strictures of the classical training she received in her formerly Soviet-occupied home-land to combine ideas gleaned from the 20th century music of the west with the long-neglected Azerbiajiani tradition of mugam. The album title Mugam Sayagi means "in the style of mugam," and that aptly describes the three commissioned pieces Ali-Zadeh wrote for Kronos Quartet.