We are pleased to announce that The Music of the Stanley Brothers by Gary B. Reid has won Best Discography in the ARSC Awards for Excellence, awarded by the Association for Recorded Sound Collections. It’s a bit of double dip for Reid. He also won Bluegrass Print/Media Person of the Year by the International Bluegrass Music Association (IBMA) in 2015.

Praised not only to but around and over the hills, The Music of the Stanley Brothers brings together forty years of passionate research. Reid augments his own vast knowledge of their music with interviews, documents ranging from books to folios sold by the brothers at shows, and the words of Ralph Stanley, former band members, guest musicians, session producers, songwriters, and bluegrass experts. The result is a reference that illuminates the Stanleys’ art and history.

It is all here: dates and locations; the roster of players on well-known and obscure sessions alike; master/matrix and catalog/release numbers, with reissue information; a full discography sorting out the Stanleys’ complex recording history; the stories behind the music; and exquisitely informed biographical notes that place events in the context of the brothers’ careers and lives. Monumental and indispensable, The Music of the Stanley Brothers provides fans and scholars alike with a guide for immersion in the long career and breathtaking repertoire of two legendary American musicians.