The keyboardist, composer and bandleader Chick Corea — one of the most revered figures in contemporary jazz, but whose work spanned fusion to classical — died on Feb. 9 at age 79.Read More
In the 1920s, the Russian physicist Leon Theremin debuted an electronic instrument that could be played without any physical contact. Players stood in front of a box and waved their hands over antennas, summoning otherworldly sounds seemingly from thin air. The theremin might have been regarded as a passing novelty if not for the late Clara Rockmore, a virtuoso who helped Read More
Mary Wilson, one of the co-founders of The Supremes, died Monday at the age of 76, her publicist announced. Wilson "passed away suddenly" at her Henderson, Nev., home, the singer's longtime friend and publicist Jay Schwartz said in a statement. No cause of death was given.Read More
Last fall, former President Barack Obama told Stephen Colbert that he was "shocked" Dolly Parton hadn't gotten a Presidential Medal of Freedom during his time in office. "That was a screwup," he said. "I think I assumed she had already got one."Read More
From Hand Habits to a violin concerto that includes whistling, this week's All Songs Considered has some surprises along the way. Hand Habits is the music of Meg Duffy. On their new EP dirt, we hear the climactic tune "4th of July," filled with Meg's intriguing guitar. It was also the guitar that attracted me to Miss Grit, the music of Korean American Margaret Sohn. She Read More
Since his first American concert, Zakir Hussain has become perhaps the most famous tabla player in the world. He now lives in California, and he says it was this performance 50 years ago that showed him that Indian classical music could be played in the West in its purest form. "It really set the tone of how I would present myself to my fellow musicians — whoever I was Read More
Osvaldo Golijov is a MacArthur "genius" composer who's written for Yo-Yo Ma, Kronos Quartet and soprano Dawn Upshaw. But in 2012, he was accused of plagiarism, and he disappeared from the scene. Only now, nearly a decade later, is Golijov reemerging — with a work that could not have a more timely subject: it's a meditation on grieving and loss.Read More
For over a decade, arts journalist Betto Arcos has been a familiar voice to public radio listeners, bringing them the sounds of the world — be it from a samba school in Rio or an amphitheater in Colombia, profiling artists who play unusual instruments or create cross-cultural mashups. More than 140 of those reports are collected in his new book, Music Stories from the Read More
This Algerian and Canadian band proves that music has no boundaries even in times of isolation. Recording its set from France and Colombia, Labess blends flamenco and Gypsy jazz-influenced North African chaabi into energetic soul music with a nonstop beat.Read More
In 2021, I'm looking forward to, fingers crossed, live music. I really miss the roar of a symphony orchestra in concert or a soaring soprano on the opera stage. But artists are still making albums, even in lockdown, like British composer Max Richter. His upcoming album is a follow-up to last year's Voices. This new one is Voices, Part 2 which will be released in April.Read More
For members of Luminous Voices, a professional choir ensemble in Alberta, Canada, rehearsing and performing safely during the pandemic has meant getting into their cars, driving to an empty parking lot and singing with each other's voices broadcast through their car radios.Read More
A little boy decked out in a pink rhinestone cowboy outfit travels around a farm and points out things that bring him joy. "A is for adventure. Every day is a brand new start. B is for boots — whether they're big or small, short or tall. C is for country," the story goes. This is the basic premise of the new kids book C Is for Country written by Lil Nas X, the Read More
As 2020 came to a close, we asked artists and authors about the songs that helped them survive a strange and devastating year. We also posed that question to you, and compiled a playlist of 101 songs that you played over and over again this year. Some songs offered an escape. Some infused joy and despair.Read More
While streams dominated this chaotic, sorrowful year, musicians continued to lay down official statements in the form of albums. And as the pandemic exploded, the economy cracked, the protests thundered and politics grew even more partisan, the arresting albums listed below became the soundtrack to my 2020 – the best in troubled times. In the order they were released are Read More
Produced by a diverse group of filmmakers assembled by 1504, a studio based in Birmingham, Ala., For The Sake Of Old Times pairs the performance of "Auld Lang Syne" with archival footage from 2020, particularly of the summer's racial justice protests.Read More
We lost icons in every genre: founders and innovators and steadfast traditionalists. The world of jazz, so reliant upon elders to anchor its constantly developing notion of history and legacy, bore an especially heavy burden.Read More
Blues legend Robert Johnson has been mythologized as a backwoods loner, his talent the result of selling his soul to the devil. Wrong and wrong again, according to Johnson's younger stepsister, who lives in Amherst, Mass. She tells his true story in Brother Robert: Growing Up with Robert Johnson, a memoir about growing up with her brother she published in June.Read More
For this Tiny Desk (home) concert, we pay a visit to the doctor's office. Actually, the venue is called Rare Violins of New York and it's something of a second home to cellist Jan Vogler, who pops in frequently to have the experts give his 1708 Stradivarius cello a thorough checkup.Read More
Break Everything — Rompan Todo in Spanish — begins in the early '60s in Mexico, where bands like Los Teen Tops started covering American hits. Others, including Mexico's Los Locos del Ritmo and Uruguay's Los Shakers also inspired many young musicians across Latin America to play their own version of rock.Read More
Pixar's new animated film Soul is the story of Joe Gardner, a middle school school music teacher with big dreams about performing jazz onstage. "Music is all I think about, from the moment I wake up in the morning to the moment I fall asleep at night," he says. "I was born to play."Read More
The humorous side of Beethoven's personality seeps into his music, such as the false stops and musical giggles that fuel his two-minute-long Presto from the Quartet Op. 130, which opens this performance. For contrast, the Borromeos follow with a serious movement from later on in the same piece, the prayerful Cavatina, which Beethoven said even got him choked up.Read More
Back in 1970, as the book was closing on The Beatles' time together, Paul McCartney came out with a release that established him as an artist in his own right — and a versatile one, who played every instrument on the album simply titled McCartney. In 1980, he followed it up with McCartney II — another kind of do-it-yourself solo album, released as another band of his, Read More
Ludwig van Beethoven charted a powerful new course in music. His ideas may have been rooted in the work of European predecessors Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Josef Haydn, but the iconic German composer became who he was with the help of some familiar American values: life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That phrase, from the Declaration of Independence, is right out Read More
There's far more to this enduring figure than the famous Fifth Symphony. And to find out, we've invited writer Jan Swafford to join us for an all-Beethoven "take-over" edition of All Songs Considered to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the composer's birth.Read More
Pride died Saturday from complications of COVID-19 in Dallas. The baritone-voiced singer was the first Black man inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame.Read More
The Pulitzer winner has released his first memoir, "Silences So Deep: Music, Solitude, Alaska." It's a personal account of Adams' formative decades making art in the Artic. Read More
This year's edition of "A Jazz Piano Christmas" features REDWOOD, Cory Henry and Kenny Barron. We're celebrating the holidays with swing from the East Coast jazz scene. Read More
As the number of COVID-19 cases skyrockets nationwide, the extent of the public health response varies from one state — and sometimes one town — to the next. The incongruous approaches and the lack of national standards have created confusion, conflict and a muddled public health message, likely hampering efforts to stop the spread of the virus. The country’s top Read More
The film continues writer Linda Kuehl's unfinished investigation into Holiday's life through never-before-heard interviews with jazz luminaries, and explores her experiences with institutional racism.Read More
From her home in Germany, the provocative American soprano delivers songs of introspection and freedom from Franz Schubert's mountaintop epiphany to Billy Taylor's wish for equality and justice.Read More
The new concert film, shot in 2018, shows one of the stars of the electronic and indie classical worlds in his element: a homebrewed nest of traditional and modern instruments working together.Read More
One of the first artists to introduce North American audiences to her style of Latin American music, the folk singer was named a 2020 National Endowment for the Arts Heritage Fellow.Read More
The thoughtful soprano believes that art is good at questioning, challenging and provoking. But the real question, she says, is: "What happens after the provocation?"Read More
Pulitzer-winning composer Anthony Davis based You Have The Right To Remain Silent, released this week as a virtual performance, on his own experience with police.Read More
"The Last Shall Be First: The JCR Records Story, Vol. 1" is a collection of gospel music first recorded in 1970s Memphis and released for the first time after years spent tracking down master tapes. Read More
Since the pandemic started, musicians have been trying to find ways to play together in real time online. Two platforms — Audio Movers and Jack Trip — offer promise.Read More
Angus Young and Brian Johnson discuss the band's new album, a tribute to Young's late brother Malcolm and an unlikely comeback from all kinds of loss.Read More
A trio of musicians gather at Aaron Copland's longtime home. Watch them play the iconic American composer's music at his own piano and beside his own writing desk.Read More
Facing a pandemic lockdown, huge political upheavals and ongoing uncertainty about the future, musicians including Oumou Sangare and Songhoy Blues offer lessons in creativity and optimism.Read More
On this special edition of All Songs Considered, NPR Music's Ann Powers and Bob Boilen explore early works of Joni Mitchell and play selections from the new box set from RhinoRead More
The pop-meet-classical duo perform a quarantine concert from their New York City apartment.Read More
An audacious concert film, an unwitting viral hit and a second Rock Hall induction: That's just the past two years for Nicks, who says that at 72 she's finally comfortable doing everything she wants.Read More
The blues prodigy performs a special Tiny Desk show at the Ground Zero Blues Club in Clarksdale, Miss.Read More
Created by Pulitzer-winning composer Ellen Reid, Soundwalk lets visitors score their socially distanced walks around the park with an ever-changing, GPS-sensitive soundtrack.Read More
Nathan Chan talks about his pandemic pick-me-ups, Yo-Yo Ma and TikTok. Before he could read, let alone read sheet music, theSeattle Symphony cellist had already conducted an orchestra through Mozart’s Variations. At 3 years old, Chan directed the San Jose Chamber Orchestra — and had to stand on a chair to see over the podium.Read More
On this show, the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis invite the Sesame Street gang onstage. Plus, trombonist Joe Fielder's Open Sesame share rare songs from the Sesame songbook.Read More
From the '80s on, Kondo stood with a new generation of free-form players, collaborating with a long list of fellow iconoclasts.Read More
Irving Berlin's classic musical turns 85 this year, and a group of artists are paying tribute with a brand-new video version of one of its songs, "Isn't This A Lovely Day (To Be Caught In The Rain)?"Read More
Lee's new film for HBO captures a live performance of Byrne's acclaimed Broadway show. David Byrne's American Utopia is a rousing blend of song, dance and revival meeting. Read More
This is the first time that the New York Philharmonic has been forced to cancel its entire concert season. No previously scheduled concerts will happen before June 2021.Read More
