Search results for

NPR's Melissa Block has been asking musicians about songs that conjure up memories of summer. For legendary New Orleans singer Aaron Neville, that song is "Ting-a-Ling," by the rhythm-and-blues group The Clovers.

Jazz trumpeter Terence Blanchard is a throwback to the socially engaged jazzman of the 1960s: He's as wrapped up in politics and society as he is in scales and improvisation. His new album, Choices, ponders questions about free will and personal responsibility.

Thanks to some nimble engineering, Armstrong has a new song coming out, complete with a backing track from the Preservation Hall Jazz Band. Engineer Earl Scioneaux III tells Gwen Thompkins just how he achieved this trick of time.

The Dante Quartet's performances of the Debussy and Ravel string quartets are etched more than most, as if they'd used fine brush strokes to carve musical shapes, rather than broad strokes that would create more wash of the musical colors.

In 1975, Michael Abramson decided to photograph the blues clubs of Chicago. The pictures Abramson took in Pepper's Hideout, among other venues, have been released in a set called Light on the South Side. Jazz critic Ed Ward takes a listen to Pepper's Jukebox, the CD released along with the photographs.

Out 'n' In, the latest album from Empirical, is a tribute to the late musician Eric Dolphy. The record contains six original pieces that adopt Dolphy's style and adaptations of two songs from his album Out to Lunch!

A few years ago, blues guitarist Eric Bibb was approached by a fan carrying a guitar case. The case held a '30s-vintage Resophonic National guitar once belonging to blues legend Booker White. Bibb persuaded the fan to lend him the instrument, then produced a record inspired by prewar Delta blues.

The charismatic conductor first heard Stravinsky's rambunctious music when he was just 8. Watch him lead the Simón Bolívar Symphony Orchestra of Venezuela live on Thursday night.

It was in Philly where Jimmy Smith first took a church instrument and made it swing. Years later, the city's jazz community gathers to salute its many soulful pioneers of the Hammond B-3 organ.

To mark 70 years in business, the Blue Note record label put together an all-star ensemble and commissioned arrangements of key compositions. Hear the burning-down-the-house highlights of The Blue Note 7's performance at the Kennedy Center.