The Bristol Sessions, 1927-1928: The Big Bang of Country Music

''The single most important event in the history of country music.'' (Johnny Cash, on the 1927 Bristol sessions)

The foundation of country music! An unsurpassed storehouse of traditional American music! Features the first recordings by the Carter Family and Jimmie Rodgers. The legendary sessions issued complete for the first and only time, including the ultra-rare follow-up sessions from 1928!

THE STORY: The recording trip made by VICTOR RECORDS to Bristol, Tennessee in July-August 1927 was a defining moment in country music. Producer Ralph Peer found two acts that acquired national and international fame: Jimmie Rodgers and the Carter Family. But more than a hundred other recordings were made at the Bristol sessions of 1927 and '28. There were ballad singers, street evangelists, string bands, gospel quartets, harmonica virtuosos, Holiness preachers, blues guitarists and rural storytellers. A snapshot of rural American music was caught in an era of rapid change: pictures of a past almost beyond recall, but preserved for ever in these magnificent recordings.

The five CDs in this set gather every surviving recording from these sessions, including alternative takes. The accompanying 120-page, LP-sized hardcover book contains newly researched essays on the background to the sessions and on the individual artists, with many rare and unpublished photographs. Also included are complete song lyrics and a detailed discography, illustrated with reproductions of the original recording sheets.