Music & Culture

Music & Culture

The 'Complete Bee Hive Recordings' Buzz With The Energy Of '70s Mainstream Jazz

1:34pm November 02, 2015

by Kevin Whitehead

A new 12-CD box set by Mosaic features a number of superior musicians who aren't household names, like saxophonists Nick Brignola and Sal Nistico. Critic Kevin Whitehead has a review.

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Music & Culture

Songs We Love: Josh Abbott Band, 'Ghosts'

11:24am November 02, 2015

by Ann Powers

The regretful first song that the country singer-songwriter composed for his group's concept album about the end of a marriage now has a video.

Neon Indian's new album VEGA INTL. Night School, is out now.

Music & Culture

Neon Indian: A Musician With The Mind Of A Filmmaker

5:23pm November 01, 2015

by NPR Staff

Alan Palomo says he deliberately took his time making his band's latest LP: "At some point I was just kind of like, 'I don't want to spend my 20s in a van."

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As Hot Sugar, Nick Koenig makes what he calls "associative music" out of sounds plucked from everyday life.

Music & Culture

Hot Sugar Makes Music Out Of Anything And Everything

1:54pm October 31, 2015

by NPR Staff

"I try to capture sounds the same way a photographer would capture an image," says musician Nick Koenig, whose songs are meticulously constructed from the noise of everyday life.

Joyce DiDonato stars in the new opera Great Scott as a world-famous diva who returns to her hometown and finds its opera company struggling to stay afloat.

Music & Culture

In 'Great Scott,' Joyce DiDonato Leads An Opera Within An Opera

11:48am October 31, 2015

by NPR Staff

The new Dallas Opera production is a meta-story about the value — and cost — of great art.

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Rod Stewart's new album, Another Country, is out now.

Music & Culture

Rod Stewart Picks Up The Pen

8:22am October 31, 2015

by NPR Staff

At age 70, after a long affair with soul standards and the American Songbook, Stewart has warmed up to writing his own material again. He joins Scott Simon to discuss the new album Another Country.

"This is a guy who's up for the challenge," says film composer Harry Gregson-Williams, describing Matt Damon's stranded astronaut character in The Martian.

Music & Culture

The Music Of 'The Martian,' Deconstructed

8:58pm October 30, 2015

by NPR Staff

In an conversation from the Song Exploder podcast, score composer Harry Gregson-Williams explains how he matched moments to melodies in the new film, which stars Matt Damon as a stranded astronaut.

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#NPRreads: White Privilege, FBI Director's Remarks On Policing, And Oyster Farming

4:00pm October 30, 2015

Also this week: a story from an NPR Music reporter about the "lost art of listening."

Dave Gahan & Soulsavers perform live at MSR Studios for WFUV.

Music & Culture

WFUV Presents: Dave Gahan & Soulsavers

1:35pm October 30, 2015

by Russ Borris

The Depeche Mode singer and the production duo fill Manhattan's MSR Studios with a 10-piece band.

Music & Culture

A Teasing Trumpeter: Jeffrey Curnow's Cartoons

1:30pm October 30, 2015

by Tom Huizenga

In the Philadelphia Orchestra trumpeter's slightly twisted world, bears play bass trombones, Liszt has a brother named Bukhett and snowblowers can be filed as musical instrument deductions.