Music

Playwright and director George C. Wolfe. He wrote and directed the hit Broadway musical Jelly's Last Jam, starring Gregory Hines, about Jelly Roll Morton. Wolfe also wrote the play The Colored Museum, a satire about the black experience in America. Jazz pianist and composer Joel Forrester joins the interview to perform some of Morton's music.

Record Producer Ernst Jorgensen. He's just put together a 5-CD box set of Elvis recordings from the 1950s, called "Elvis: The King of Rock 'n' Roll--The Complete '50's Masters." It includes several alternate takes, early demos, and some previously unreleased tracks.

A concert and interview with producer/performer/songwriter T. Bone Burnett. Rolling Stone once called him "the best songwriter in America." He's produced records for Elvis Costello, John Hiatt, Marshall Crenshaw, and others. His new album is called "The Criminal Under My Own Hat."

Scott sang with Lionel Hampton's band in the late 1940s early 50s, and influenced such singers as Nancy Wilson, Marvin Gaye, and Stevie Wonder. Despite his talent, Scott has had a sporadic career marked by long periods of obscurity. His distinctive voice reaches into high registers, which many listeners early on mistook for a woman's. His new album is called "All the Way."

Classical music critic Lloyd Schwartz reviews a new album featuring the Italian pianist Maurizio Pollini playing four scherzis of Chopin.

Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews the new CD by Edward Wilkerson's group, "8 Bold Souls." It's called "Sideshow," on the Arabesque Jazz label. Wilkerson came from Chicago's Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians, which spawned several cutting edge icons of jazz.

Classical music critic Lloyd Schwartz reviews "2 x Winterreise," a reinterpretation of a series of 24 poems by Wihelm Mueller set to the music of Schubert.

Jazz critic Kevin Whithead reviews "Nightingale," the new release by Scottish saxophonist Joe Temperley, who carries on the musical legacy of Duke Ellington sax player Harry Carney.

Rock critic Ken Tucker reviews the new album by the brains behind the most popular incarnation of Fleetwood Mac.

Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews the new live album from the Clifford Jordan Big Band. They perform weekly in New York City.

At the age of 72, Farrell has had a long career: she began in radio in the 1940s with her own show on CBS. In the fifties, she started singing opera, and has performed with every major opera company and symphony orchestra in the U.S., including five seasons with the Metropolitan Opera in New York. Starting in the sixties, she began putting out albums of jazz standards, and has just released her twelfth, called "It's Over."

The Village Voice says classically trained Niemack is like "Barbra Streisand without the hysterics....She combines the best of both worlds; a cabaret singer's respect for melody as written and a jazz singer's eagerness to have a go at it." Her new album is called "Heart's Desire."

Rock critic Ken Tucker reviews new rap albums by Me Phi Me, Basehead and Arrested Development, all of which bring a cool, bohemian intensity to the genre.

Astor Piazzolla died Sunday at the age of 71. He was an Argentinian composer whose updated tangos were a hybrid of classical music, jazz and rock. He was also a gifted player of the bandoneon, a kind of accordion that gives tango its distinctive sound. Piazzola had suffered a stroke nearly two years ago, from which he never recovered. We present a rebroadcast of our 1988 interview with him.

Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead reviews the new CD by Cleveland saxophonist Ernie Krivda. Whitehead says Krivda may have been more famous had he moved to New York.

Rock and roll historian Ed Ward profiles The Falcons, a Detroit band who, despite making excellent music, came at the wrong place and time.

Journalist and biographer Nick Tosches. His new biography is "Dino: Living High in the Dirty Business of Dreams," (by Doubleday). It's about singer Dean Martin but it also looks at the culture that created him. He was part of the mob culture, and Hollywood's "Rat Pack." The book also delves into the reasons for the infamous breakup between Dean Martin and his comedy partner, Jerry Lewis. Dean Martin is now 75 years old.

A concert and interview with Shirley Horn. Playing with her will be drummer Steve Williams and bassist Charles Ables. HORN recorded with Miles Davis and Quincy Jones in the 1960s and sang on the movie soundtrack of "For Love of Ivy." After a hiatus in which she stayed home and raised her daughter, she returned to performing and recording in 1988. Her 1991 album, "You Won't Forget Me," brought together Toots Thielemans, Buck Hill, Wynton and Branford Marsalis, and Miles Davis. The album was nominated for a Grammy.

Rock critic Ken Tucker confronts the success of Billy Ray Cyrus.

Rock historian Ed Ward looks at some pop singers who got their start in gospel. Artists discussed include Sam Cooke, Johnny Taylor, The Five Royales, Aretha Franklin, Lou Rawls, James Brown, and Shirley Ceasar.