Time-Life collections don't have the vague cachet of respectability and quality they used to have -- they're putting out Beavis & Butthead videotapes now -- but the Time-Life Collection of Classic Country Music is pretty good, and an excellent way to sample dozens of artists. It was originally 10 discs for $120, now it's 9 discs plus a disc of Hank Williams for the same price, but I wouldn't necessarily recommend it unless you can find it the way I found it -- two 4CD sets for $32 each at one of the big-box stores. I missed out on a late 40s disc and a late 70s disc, but there's a hell of a lot of good stuff in between. And if anybody hasn't mentioned Bill Monroe yet, you gotta get some Bill Monroe! I recommend The Essential Bill Monroe and the Monroe Brothers on RCA, 1936-1941 recordings from before Monroe added banjo to the band and established the sound of what we call bluegrass today. At this stage it's still "just" hillbilly music, and an intermediate step between the Anthology of American Folk Music era and the Nashville years covered in the Time-Life sets. "New River Train," "Orange Blossom Special," lots of church music, all of it great. William Crump