For decades, he created unique roles for his fiddle. Hear an interview and performance for Billy Taylor’s Jazz At The Kennedy Center, an archival NPR program.

The pianist solos in his original “Lullaby for Rabbit,” host Marian McPartland performs a “Portrait of Makoto Ozoné,” and together they enjoy musical jokes in Sonny Rollins’ “Sonnymoon for Two.”

Stigers performs his original “You’ve Got the Fever,” and host Michael Feinstein joins him for a duet of the standard “You Are Too Beautiful.”

Oscar Peterson was one of the giants of jazz piano. On this program from 1998, Peterson demonstrates his deft touch and amazing technique.

We had hoped that the great drummer Brian Blade would give us a little backstage percussion exhibition. But rain scuttled those plans. Instead, he and his band worked out a different kind of beauty.

In this session from 2005, the prolific songwriter performs some of his most famous works, such as “What the World Needs Now is Love” and “Close to You.”

The virtuoso jazz musicians perform from their new album of duets. It features hymns based on a tradition called shape-note singing, which dates to the early 1800s.

The Puerto Rican tenor saxophonist joins a select international ensemble from one of jazz’s top conservatories in a festival-opening performance of his own compositions.