In July 1927, producer Ralph Peer set up a portable electric recording studio on the third floor of a hat factory on State Street in Bristol, on the Tennessee-Virginia line, and in 12 days captured 76 songs by 19 acts. This episode explains why those sessions are called the big bang of country music.

We cover the old acoustic horn method, the 1925 electric microphone that made field recording possible, Peer’s $1-a-year salary in exchange for publishing rights, the $50-per-side deal, the newspaper story about Ernest Stoneman’s royalties that turned a slow start into a gold rush, and the arrivals of the Carter Family and Jimmie Rodgers.

• Why rural musicians rarely reached New York studios before 1927
• What retaining publishing rights meant, and the ethics debate around Peer’s deal
• How Maybelle Carter’s guitar style let a trio sound like a full band
• The boarding house fight that made Jimmie Rodgers a solo act
• El Watson, a 20-voice choir, and the range of music captured that week