Dolly (Sony Legacy, 2009)

Over the course of 99 tracks on 4 discs, RCA/Legacy Recordings has given music fans a concise and nearly complete snapshot of Dolly Parton's considerable impact on country music with the release of the new box set - a task not accomplished by any other collection.

The set covers all the career-defining hits you would expect like Jolene, 9 To 5, Islands In The Stream, I Will Always Love You and Here You Come Again, but what makes this collection truly special is the unreleased material it includes - eight new tracks in all.

The most notable of these previously unreleased recordings is also one of the earliest. Gonna Hurry (As Slow As I Can) is a demo recording from either the late 1950s or early 1960s of a song Parton co-penned with her uncle, Bill Owens. This track is joined by Nobody But You, an unreleased 1962 recording of Dolly with the Merry Melody Sisters, as excellent examples of Dolly's early pop tendencies.

Although Parton's recent critically-acclaimed bluegrass recordings for the Sugar Hill Records label are noticeably absent from this set, the depth and breadth of the material presented here gives an accurate accounting of significant role Parton played in the history of country music - a legacy truly deserving of a comprehensive set like this.