Marty Stuart will release Compadres: An Anthology of Duets on June 5, launching a year-long celebration of country music. That week will also include the opening of his museum exhibit of country memorabilia and a concert tour kicking off with "Marty Stuart's 6th Annual Late Night Jam."

Each of the upcoming album's 14 tracks features Marty with one of the many legendary artists he has met on a musical journey that began at age 13 on the road with Lester Flatt. Featured songs include the rural lament "Farmer's Blues," recorded with Merle Haggard during the pair's 2003 Electric Barnyard tour; "Crying, Waiting, Hoping" with Steve Earle; and a collaboration with gospel great Mavis Staples on "Move Along Train," showcasing the building melody penned by the late Pop Staples.

The new work also highlights never-before-heard duets with Loretta Lynn on Dallas Frazier's "Will You Visit Me on Sunday" and with bluegrass quintet Old Crow Medicine Show on a version of The Who's "I Can See for Miles." Other partners are B.B. King, Johnny Cash, George Jones, Del McCoury, Travis Tritt, Lester Flatt and the Nashville Grass, Earl Scruggs, the Staples Singers and Marty's wife, Connie Smith.

"The people on Compadres come from a wildcat America, a less tamed America," Marty says. "Pops Staples, Steve Earle, Earl Scruggs, B.B. King, these are the kind of people who made America a more interesting place — sonically, visually, spiritually. Those are the people I wanted to emulate as a kid, the people I ended up traveling with. I like to think I ended up one of them. They brought a complexity to their music; they brought their sweat, their soul, their lives."