"Bobby Bridger witnessed it all. His memoir reads like an epic poem itself as he crosses paths with the icons of modern American music, art, literature, family, and culture—from the self-obsessive glory days of the early 1970s to today's legendary Native American keepers of the flame—riding on his survival skills and a generation's worth of wanderlust, all the while sculpting his own unique artistic expression via the winds of fate, desire, synchronicity, and a large dose of providence."

—Eliza Gilkyson

"Exploring both the heart of the American music industry and its creative hinterlands, Bridger chronicles an artistic journey filled with possibility and innovation, challenges and risks. The development of Bobby Bridger's ethical commitment to his music and painting is nothing short of inspiring, and he tells the tale through a self-reflection as honest and creative as the new forms he has crafted in his art and his career. Bridger is a national treasure. This book explains how and why."

—Philip J. Deloria, University of Michigan, author of Playing Indian and Indians in Unexpected Places

Renowned for A Ballad of the West, his epic trilogy about the American West from the era of mountain man Jim Bridger to the closing of the frontier, Bobby Bridger has had a career in show business that spans the rockabilly-to-"Music City, USA" era in Nashville, the cosmic cowboy scene in Austin, the flowering of folk music, and even Broadway theater. His multifaceted talents have found expression in singing, acting, writing, painting, and sculpting. In this engrossing account of the personal and artistic journey that led him to create a new American art form, the epic ballad, Bridger touches on almost every major musical, entertainment, and cultural movement of the second half of the twentieth century, with a cast of characters that reads like a "Who's Who" of American popular culture.

Bridger's story begins in a small town in northeast Louisiana, where he first experienced the twin attractions of painting and music. He recounts his early efforts to become a successful Nashville singer-songwriter and his growing awareness that the commercial music business would never support his evolving desire to become a historical balladeer. Bridger recalls how his interest in folk music and folk ballads fired his ambition to tell the story of the American West. He movingly describes how this dream eventually became A Ballad of the West, an epic trilogy about Jim Bridger, the Lakota Sioux, and Buffalo Bill that has taken form in an acclaimed cycle of songs, a one-man show, books, full-cast stage performances, and other media.

Included in the book is a DVD that offers songs from A Ballad of the West and a sample from the forthcoming documentary Quest of an Epic Balladeer, based on Bobby Bridger's life and work.