Selling a million copies of his song 'Blue Yodel' in 1927, Jimmie Rodgers was
the first country music star and became recognised as the father of country
music thereafter. It wasn't the only tag laid on him - he was also known as The
Blue Yodeller and The Singing Brakeman as drawing on old blues as well as
writing his own songs, his influence stretched far and wide from Gene Autry,
Mississippi John Hurt and Johnny Cash to Jerry Lee Lewis and Van Morrison. He
was even the subject of the Clint Eastwood movie 'Honkytonk Man' in 1982.
Following the death of his mother when he was ...