The late American pianist, composer, and “Legend of Jazz,” Randy Weston, stretched across history to forge connections to an African past, as he had done for decades.
On his 2017 recording, The African Nubian Suite, Weston took as his subject matter the very origins of humanity – the fossilized skeletal remains of “Ardi,” a hominid who lived around 4.5 million years ago in what is now Ethiopia. This "planetary music," as Weston called it stretches across millennia, looking to the Nubian empire (now northern Sudan/southern Egypt), African folk traditions, Sufi music, blues, and jazz. Randy Weston joined us in-studio in 2017. (From the Archives.) 
  

Jazz Pianist And Innovator Randy Weston Renews a Connection With His African Past (Archives)

WNYC, New York Public Radio, brings you Soundcheck, the arts and culture program hosted by John Schaefer, who engages guests and listeners in lively, inquisitive conversations with established and rising figures in New York City's creative arts scene. Guests come from all disciplines, including pop, indie rock, jazz, urban, world and classical music, technology, cultural affairs, TV and film. Recent episodes have included features on Michael Jackson,Crosby Stills & Nash, the Assad Brothers, Rackett, The Replacements, and James Brown.

Arts

Literature

Performing Arts

Design

Food

Fashion & Beauty

Visual Arts

Music

Music Interviews

Music Commentary

Deerlady is the name of the band led by singer and bassist Mali Obomsawin and guitarist and singer Magdalena Abrego. Mali was part of the folk rock trio called Lula Wiles; then she released her album of Indigenous jazz called Sweet Tooth in 2022, drawing heavily on her Abenaki heritage. Magdalena, a Chicago-born guitarist whose parents migrated from Mexico and Puerto Rico, has played with the minimalism-meets-jazz collective known as Numinous, as well as the improvising sax player Allison Burik. In January, the two of them released their first album together, with the cheeky title Greatest Hits, “a collection of songs about intimacy under colonialism by Mali Obomsawin" (Bandcamp), and it sees the two of them turning the amps to 11 and pairing softly sung vocals with roaring guitars. Deerlady plays their shoegazey headbangers, mostly unplugged, in-studio.
1. Masterpieces 2. Believer 3. There There
Greatest Hits by Deerlady, Mali Obomsawin, Magdalena Abrego,

Indie Fuzz-Rock Duo Deerlady's Shoegaze With Bite

London vocalist, multi-instrumentalist and producer Cosmo Sheldrake creates songs and sound worlds out of people, places, creatures, plants, fungi, and collected sounds. With his combination of traditional instrumentation and electronic production, field recordings, and both human and more-than-human voices (birdsong and insect choruses), Sheldrake pursues adventures in song, capturing the childlike wonder of a curious tea party, and staying connected to the natural world throughout. Cosmo Sheldrake juxtaposes these orchestrated natural sounds with his racks of gear to share his marvelous sound world in some songs from his latest, Eye to the Ear, in-studio.
Set list: 1. Stop the Music 2. I Did and I Don't and I Do 3. Does the Swallow Dream of Flying?



Eye To The Ear by Cosmo Sheldrake

Cosmo Sheldrake's Marvelous Sound World of Natural Song

Honduran-American artist Lorely Rodriguez, known professionally as Empress Of, is a singer, songwriter, musician and record producer based in Los Angeles, California. Her albums are full of bright, indie pop that mixes dance music, electronica, trap, and on her most recent album, Latin music. Empress Of’s new album, her fourth, is called For Your Consideration, and it’s a mischievous exploration of heartbreak, affairs, regaining your sexiness, and pursuing lust and control. Empress Of plays some stripped down versions of some of the new songs, in-studio. - Caryn Havlik
Set list: 1.Lorelei 2. Kiss Me 3. What's Love

Empress Of Explores Yin/Yang of Romance and Plays Intimate Songs, In-Studio

Welsh musician and songwriter Gruff Rhys (of Super Furry Animals, the pop outfit known for their catchy songs and weird videos) poetically harnesses both the gritty and the trippy in his own music. But he’s also a composer, producer, filmmaker and author. His latest release, the 25th album of his career (individually, collaboratively and as a member of various bands), is a solo album called Sadness Sets Me Free, sung in English, and left open to chance. Rhys and his bandmates play some of these new songs, in-studio.
Set list: 1. Bad Friend 2. Sadness Sets Me Free 3. Celestial Candyfloss



Sadness Sets Me Free by Gruff Rhys

Welsh Musician and Songwriter Gruff Rhys Coexists and Persists

Formed in North London, Bombay Bicycle Club is the sound of four best friends finding joy and savoring the connection in making music together and experimenting. They think of themselves as a genre-less band (The Independent), “not bound down by genre in a way that a lot of our contemporaries were”. With the 2023 release of My Big Day, and an EP called Fantasies, both of which feature a host of guest vocalists, it’s clear that they’re still freely mixing sounds and cover a lot of ground, sonically. Bombay Bicycle Club plays an unplugged set in-studio.   
Set list: 1. Turn The World On 2. Diving 3. Luna
 

Jazz Pianist And Innovator Randy Weston Renews a Connection With His African Past (Archives)

Download our free app to listen on your phone