The Lincoln-Douglas Debates Named a 2009 GRAMMY® Nominee

BBC Audiobooks America is pleased to announce that its recent recording The Lincoln-Douglas Debates, starring actors David Strathairn as Abraham Lincoln and Richard Dreyfuss as Stephen Douglas, has been nominated for a GRAMMY^® Award for Best Spoken Word Album. This unprecedented project marked the first time the full unabridged version of all seven debates was recorded for audio.
 
Producer Dan Hypes spearheaded the recording of this groundbreaking aural history, with brilliant performances by renowned Academy Award®-Winning actor Richard Dreyfuss (W, The Goodbye Girl, Jaws) and Academy Award® nominee David Strathairn (Good Night, and Good Luck), The fourteen-disc audiobook also contains a special introduction by Allen C. Guelzo, the Henry R. Luce III Professor of the Civil War Era at Gettysburg College and author of Lincoln and Douglas: The Debates That Defined America.
 
Jeff Golick, Editorial Manager of BBC Audiobooks America, commissioned the recording of these seminal debates. "Our role as publishers is to inform and entertain. One way to do that is to take something of tremendous historical value and make it new for today's audience. The BBC has a long tradition of producing high-quality radio productions; this is one we think will stand alongside those landmark recordings."
 
In its January issue, AudioFile magazine praised the recording: "David Strathairn (Lincoln) and Richard Dreyfuss (Douglas) do an excellent job acting out these historic meetings... they successfully mimic the speaking patterns and pacing unique to orators of that era... Strathairn and Dreyfuss reconstruct the passion and lively repartee that characterized their confrontations." Listen to a clip of this unique productionat our website.
 
The 52nd Annual GRAMMY® Award winners will be held on January 31, 2010, at Staples Center in Los Angeles and once again will be broadcast live on CBS from 8-11:30 pm (ET/PT).