The Nashville a Team Collection

Gentleman Jim Reeves was perhaps the biggest male star to emerge from the Nashville sound. His mellow baritone voice and muted velvet orchestration combined to create a sound that echoed around his world and has lasted to this day. Detractors will call the sound country-pop (or plain pop), but none can argue against the large audience that loves this music. Reeves was capable of singing hard country ("Mexican Joe" went to number one in 1953), but he made his greatest impact as a country-pop crooner. From 1955 through 1969, Reeves was consistently in the country and pop charts – an amazing fact in light of his untimely death in an airplane accident in 1964. Not only was he a presence in the American charts, but he became country music's foremost international ambassador and, if anything, was even more popular in Europe and Britain than in his native America.

Shannon Shaw, of the quartet Shannon and the Clams, is releasing her first solo project: debut album Shannon in Nashville due on June 8. The California singer is opening up her world for everyone to see in this solidified record. This album may be a solo LP, but Shaw emphasizes the teamwork put into making such a personal work of art. Working with some of her biggest inspirations like The Black Keys' Dan Auerbach along with a team of old-school musicians associated with Elvis Presley and Aretha Franklin was challenging and crucial at the same time. "Songwriting with them was such a good exercise in self-esteem – I had to remind myself I’m an artist, I’m a great songwriter, and I should be there," Shaw told Billboard.

Premier banjo player Béla Fleck is considered one of the most innovative pickers in the world and has done much to demonstrate the versatility of his instrument, which he uses to play everything from traditional bluegrass to progressive jazz. He was named after composer Béla Bartok and was born in New York City. Around age 15, Fleck became fascinated with the banjo after hearing Flatt & Scruggs' "Ballad of Jed Clampett" and Eric Weissberg and Steve Mandell's "Dueling Banjos," and his grandfather soon gave him one. While attending the High School of Music and Art in New York, Fleck worked on adapting bebop music for the banjo.