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By Dan Leone

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As an introduction to "four decades of the very best acoustic folk music from the British Isles," The Acoustic Folk Box makes necessary sacrifices for the sake of breadth. Almost anyone slightly familiar with the genre will notice a few obvious exclusions – Fairport Convention, Planxty, Christy Moore – and question certain choices. Moreover, fans of Fiona Ritchie's in-depth radio show The Thistle and Shamrock might find this four-CD, 85-track collection more frustrating than enlightening. But those looking to bone up on the roots and evolution of the folk revival on the other side of the pond will relish investigating the artists in this collection. Such listeners might start with disc four (the '90s), where Billy Bragg, Richard Thompson, Altan, Kate Rusby, June Tabor, Emmylou Harris (huh? – OK, in a trio with Delores Keane and Mary Black), Eliza Carthy, and other familiars grant easy entry. Then work back, decade by decade, through a maze of English, Irish, and Scottish singers, fiddlers, accordionists, and pipers – traditionalists and modernizers – to skiffle king Lonnie Donegan (1957). Along the way the transatlantically famous (Ralph McTell, Sandy Denny, Pentangle, John Renbourn, Bert Jansch, the Incredible String Band, the Bothy Band, Frankie Armstrong, Dick Gaughan, John Kirkpatrick, Ewan MacColl, Martin Carthy, the Watersons) mix it up with a host of hidden treasures, both historic (Anne Briggs, Shirley Collins, Nic Jones) and contemporary (Coope, Boyes and Simpson, Nancy Kerr, John Tams), as well as political radicals (Leon Rosselson, Rory McLeod). The perfunctory historical essays are redeemed by informative track-by-track profiles that, coupled with the often inspiring music, will likely launch you on a voyage into deeper waters. (Derk Richardson)