The collection includes 634 fiddle tunes on twenty-four compact discs that Madison County, North Carolina fiddler Roger Howell recorded over the course of multiple sessions in 2007, 2013 and from 2015 to 2018. Howell was inspired by Bascom Lamar Lunsford’s “Memory Collections” of songs, fiddle tunes, and stories that he recorded for Columbia University in 1935 and the Library of Congress in 1949. Each of Lunsford’s “Memory Collections” includes over 300 recordings, with a total of 350 unique pieces. In 2007, Roger Howell recorded 355 mostly unaccompanied fiddle tunes on thirteen compact discs, with commentary that gives the tunes' alternative names and origins. In the years after Roger Howell completed that feat of memory, he realized he knew more songs he wanted to record for his Memory Collection. Roger Howell began the recording process once again in 2013 and added an additional 177 tunes, most with guitar accompaniment, on seven compact discs. From 2015 to 2018 he recorded 102 more tunes on four compact discs.
The Roger Howell Memory Collection of Fiddle Tunes has deep roots in Madison County, featuring information about and versions of many tunes once played by Woodrow Boone, Tommy Hunter, Marvin Faulkner, Jeter Edwards, Doug Phillips, and Carl Dean Reese, as well as several original Roger Howell compositions. The collection also reflects Howell’s breadth of knowledge about fiddle music in the United States and Europe with tunes from Manco Sneed, Ed Haley, Fiddlin' Arthur Smith, J. Crate Boone, Tommy Jackson, J.P. Fraley, Charlie Acuff, John Hartford, Bill Monroe, Art Galbraith, Owen “Snake” Chapman, Turlough O’Carolan, "Howdy" Forrester, Dr. Mack Snoderly, Kenny Baker, Tommy Magness, Vernon Riddle, Fiddlin' Doc Roberts, Benny Thomasson, Eck Robertson, Melvin Wine, Stephen Foster, Grover Sutton, Gordon Freeman, Don Messer, Buddy Thomas, Clark Kessinger, Paul Warren, Bill Northcutt, Texas Shorty, Bob Walters, Ramona Jones, Dona Cavanagh, Gid Tanner, James Bryan, Gaither Carlton, Lynn "Chirps" Smith, and many others.
Roger Howell recorded both the 2007 and 2013 sessions in his workshop on Banjo Branch Road in Mars Hill, North Carolina using a Tascam 464 4-track cassette recorder, Behringer 1204FX mixer, and Shure SM-57 microphones. The Liston B. Ramsey Center for Regional Studies at Mars Hill College assisted Roger Howell in depositing copies of his 2007 recordings at other college and university archives with an interest in traditional Appalachian music, including the University of North Carolina at Asheville, Appalachian State University, East Tennessee State University, Middle Tennessee State University, and Berea College.