Hank Williams, So Lonesome (American Made Music)
Although he never made it to 30 and died nearly a half-century  ago, singer/songwriter Hank Williams continues to exert  tremendous influence on all spheres of popular music. The  country crooner also continues to invite biographical treatment.  In 1998, music historian Escott (Hank Williams: A Biography) and  Florita, former marketer of the Hank Williams catalog for  Mercury Records Nashville, produced the Grammy-winning, ten-CD  set The Complete Hank Williams. While working on that project,  they amassed a huge number of photographs, documents, and  published and unpublished song lyrics. That iconography forms  the basis of Hank Williams: Snapshots from the Lost Highway, an  appealing coffee-table book that is being cross-promoted with  the tribute album, Timeless. Composed of captions by the authors  and excerpts of interviews with Williams and his family and  friends, the text is somewhat sparse but to the point and well  written. Rick Bragg also contributes an elegant foreword. Koon's Hank Williams, So Lonesome was first published as Hank  Williams: A Bio-Bibliography (Greenwood, 1993). This second take  features expanded biographical coverage and important  discussions of Williams's songs. Also significant are the  author's attempts to separate the facts of Williams's life and  work from the mythology of the musician and his thoughtful  assessment of sources. In eliminating the reference-book  qualities of the earlier Greenwood volume, Koons has made a  significant contribution to Williams literature for fans and  scholars. As a pair, these books nearly perfectly complement  each other, but, unfortunately, neither contains a discography.  In addition, the Escott and Florita volume lacks a bibliography  (perfectly acceptable for a work of this kind), and the Koons  book contains only a scaled-back one. Despite these  shortcomings, both books avoid sensationalizing their complex  subject and are highly recommended for public libraries and  academic libraries with a popular culture focus. James E.  Perone, Mount Union Coll., Alliance, OHCopyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.