A giant of country music and one of the founding fathers of rock ’n’ roll, Johnny Cash, The Man in Black, was best known for seminal songs such as Ring of Fire, I Walk the Line and Folsom Prison Blues.

He refused to toe any music industry line but despite that he left a legacy of classic hit singles, dozens of critically-acclaimed albums and a life story fiction writers would dismiss as too extraordinary to be taken seriously.

Through the highs of the hit singles to the lows of dying on the operating table before being resuscitated, being diagnosed with a terminal disease only to miraculously recover and all-too-frequent career dips, Johnny Cash triumphed over unbelievable adversity.

With rock-like features that could have been hewn from Mount Rushmore, Cash’s larger-than-life persona, embodied by his gravelly-voiced delivery, made him an icon to millions of fans throughout the world, and an example to many of music’s top stars.

To commemorate the first anniversary of his death last year, Virgin Books have released Cash: A Tribute To Johnny Cash, an immense 224-page hardback book featuring over 100 rare photographs of one of the greatest music legends of the American music scene.

The book is written by the Editors of Rolling Stone, who, over the years have followed Cash's career, writing about him in settings that ranged from the San Quentin prison to a classy Las Vegas hotel.

There’s a moving foreword by daughter Rosanne, never-before-published photographs from the Cash family archive, a 1973 interview conducted by Robert Hilburn which shows Cash at the peak of his game, David Fricke's interview with Rick Rubin, offering moving insight into the remarkable ten-year relationship between Rubin and Cash that produced some of the finest albums of his career, extensive discography, and personal tributes from world stars Bob Dylan, Sheryl Crow, Tom Petty, and Bono.

From beginning in Memphis's Sun Records during the mid-fifties, in the same studios where Elvis Presley was cutting his first records, through the next 50 years, Cash became the only person other than Elvis to be inducted to both the Country Music and Rock ’n’ Roll Halls of Fame.

He sold over 50 million records, and won 11 Grammys. Then, against all odds, his career underwent a resurgence in the last years of his life, connecting with a new generation of music fans with the critically acclaimed cover project, American Recordings.

n Cash: A Tribute to Johnny Cash, is available from Virgin Books, £19.99.