Should you ever meet Donny McCaslin, you’ll encounter an imposingly tall fellow who’s one of the nicest guys you’ll shake hands with — and who wields a sax like few others. They played a side stage in the morning. The audience didn’t know what hit ‘em.

Heath joins host Marian McPartland and bassist Rufus Reid for an hour of unforgettable talk and music, including “You’ve Changed” and Heath’s most famous tune, “Gingerbread Boy.”

From church services to arguments at the table, the jazz musician finds himself drawn to the music of the everyday. His debut album, Live Today, is anchored in jazz grooves and layered with influences from hip-hop to gospel.

Duke’s career spanned five decades and he always straddled the line between disparate genres, collaborating with artists such as Miles Davis, Barry Manilow and Frank Zappa.

The singer-songwriter and guitarist plays a couple of Gershwin tunes with host Marian McPartland.

A 20-something singing pianist of the New Orleans virtuoso tradition, Jon Batiste has a natural entertainer’s charisma and chops to match. He met his band in school at Juilliard — and can do “modern jazz” with a metropolitan attitude. And yes, there’s a tuba.

This year actually marks three dozen years since the first incarnation of the group coalesced to resurrect a then-disappearing tradition — and infuse it with both bebop and funk. One of the original new-school New Orleans brass bands ignites dancing in the aisles.

One of the finest guitar players in jazz history — who made all those classic records with Sonny Rollins, Bill Evans, Ron Carter and so on — is still at it at age 82. He’s joined by a much younger guitar phenom in a cross-generational confab of guitar heroes.

See Michel Camilo’s stomping Oxfords and Esperanza Spalding’s vibrating bass in pixel portraits.

Among the most influential jazz composers of all time, the saxophonist turns 80 this year. He returns to Newport with his crackerjack quartet to celebrate, and his old friend Herbie Hancock also swung through Rhode Island to mark the occasion.

One gets the sense that the pianist feels completely at ease with his Experiment quartet, running his right hand in circles, cracking jokes and switching directions on the fly. Hear a freewheeling set of vamps and vocoder from the hip-hop hybrid band, with a Herbie Hancock tune followed by a Daft Punk cover.

The guitarist’s electronics-enhanced trio is driven by what its leader calls “textural surprise” — and by the memory of drummer Paul Motian. On stage, that’s a point of departure for a sonically diverse set of original compositions — and one Keith Jarrett tune.

See Marcus Miller’s Bruce Lee action figure, Wayne Shorter’s birthday set and more from Newport.

Take a New-Orleans-style brass band, then shrink it: That’s the general principle of how the trombonist’s band makes a joyful noise with only four members. With sousaphone and attitude, Anderson and company presents a suite inspired by his hometown of Chicago.

The trumpeter was a jazz and classical rising star when he started studying the hammered dulcimer and the modal music of his Iraqi heritage. His Two Rivers band splits the difference, using microtonal techniques to investigate the blues. It plays from a new commission.

The Berklee College of Music graduate grew up in the Palestinian territories, where music was literally what kept him off the streets. He’s translated that into a command of a 72-string instrument called the qanun. Now stateside, he’s blended it into in a fluid, jazz-based context.

A guitarist who sounds like no other, Halvorson can both astound and confound, with craggy phrasing, strange pitch-bends and pedal effects galore. She arrives at Newport as a bandleader, directing a classic instrumentation through several left-hand turns.

The New York pianist’s trio is about as elegant as it gets. It’s crashed by a clarinet summit when a veteran reedman straight outta Sidney Bechet arrives, and a young star joins in the fun. It makes for a refreshing hint of traditional jazz, as per Newport tradition.

As a whole, the trumpeter’s high-functioning band reliably serves up sleek modernism in the form of post-bop jazz. It plays from its new album Magnetic, and welcomes a guest turn from guitarist Lionel Loueke, making this band a rare six-man quintet. Herbie Hancock also joins on “Footprints.”

On the new album Dysnomia, the band Dawn of Midi uses acoustic instruments — drums, bass and piano — to create what often sounds like looping, minimal electronic music.

If you didn’t manage to sneak your way onto a yacht bound for coastal Rhode Island — well, we can’t help you get to Newport. But NPR Music can bring you live streaming concerts. Here’s what’s in store, starting with Robert Glasper and ending with Wayne Shorter and Herbie Hancock.

Whether career sidemen, appealing experimentalists or critically acclaimed bands finally getting a look, new names are getting invited to the granddaddy of jazz festivals with greater frequency. Hear music from some of this year’s crop, including Jonathan Batiste, David Gilmore and Dee Alexander.

On the clarinetist’s latest album, the blues might be modernized or tweaked, but it’s never far away. Fresh Air‘s jazz critic says The Edenfred Files is modest in a good way, like a musical chapbook or novella. The scale suits Harper’s pointedly focused music.

Few had the late Fort Apache Band drummer’s intuition for both jazz and Afro-Cuban musical languages. Bandleader Jerry González remembers his colleague, who toured with Mongo Santamaria, Art Blakey, Tito Puente and Max Roach, and earned a Grammy nomination for one of his own albums.

This summer has seen plenty of worthwhile jazz, including a pianist who’s been around since the ’50s, a Caribbean jazzman, a band of deliberate melody, and a Jungle Book cover. Sample recordings from Harold Mabern, Etienne Charles, the band Black Host and Lauren Desberg.

In 1963, a jazz-obsessed, college-educated black Beat poet in New York wrote a “theoretical endeavor” linking the sociopolitical and the sonic. A half-century later, Amiri Baraka’s book remains the first of its kind — and among the most important — in African-American studies.

Session musician Stephen Bruner has played bass in other people’s bands for more than a decade. He can play metal, R&B, hip-hop, jazz. And he’s been folding all that into his own music, which he puts out under the name Thundercat. Now, with his second album, he’s stepping to the front of the stage.

The composer behind the Mission: Impossible theme plays a set spanning Stravinsky and Gillespie.

As a first-call trumpeter in many jazz, Latin and Broadway ensembles, Frink made a lot of bands sound good. But she was better known as someone who made thousands of other trumpet players sound better. The foremost brass instructor in New York City, Frink was 62.

Bunch learned to arrange for big bands while held captive in a German POW camp during WWII. After returning stateside, he worked with the likes of Woody Herman, Gene Krupa and Benny Goodman, and was Tony Bennett’s pianist for a number of years. Bunch died earlier this year, so Piano Jazz remembers him with this 1991 session.

The blend of flute and vibraphone or marimba brings a transparent, sparkling quality — light and listenable, but permitting depth and mystery. On new albums, Nicole Mitchell and Anna Webber harness this energy, which has a surprisingly rich history

Virginia’s No BS! Brass Band taps into, and ultimately expands, the brass-band tradition. Whether kicking it with funk or clearing room for a screeching free-jazz solo, the group redefines what large brass ensembles can do.

Benson and the late Nat King Cole have a lot in common: Both started as acclaimed jazz instrumentalists, but became pop stars when they started singing. Cole was a huge influence on Benson, and the guitarist — who turned 70 this spring — pays tribute on his latest album.

Ron Carter has set the standard for modern jazz bass players. He rose to fame with Miles Davis, but went on to play with Stan Getz and Thelonious Monk. His recording work spans 2,000 albums, and he’s had equally successful careers as a bandleader, composer and educator. Hear the bassist in a session on Piano Jazz.

The violinist joins host Michael Feinstein to play Fats Waller’s “Ain’t Misbehavin’” and more.

As rich as Anat Cohen’s Anzic Orchestra is with brass, woodwinds and cellos, Avishai Cohen’s Triveni trio is spare with just trumpet, bass and drums. Born and raised in Tel Aviv, the siblings perform together and apart at the Newport Jazz Festival and the Kennedy Center.

The music has become a point of pride for the United States: a homegrown art form forged from folk traditions. The black jazz pioneers who lived through eras of discrimination have a complicated pride in the U.S. Hear five improvised takes on American patriotic songs, from reverent to ironic.

For saxophonist Dayna Stephens, serenity has been a key to dealing with a rare kidney disease. It’s filtered into his playing and composing, which is on the upswing despite health challenges that drain hours from his days and thousands of dollars a week from his limited budget.

The jazz masters’ first album of entirely original material pushes music lovers to dance. At its heart, That’s It! is a memory trick, managing to sound both familiar and fresh. But this is more than a live performance by a hot band.

Every release by the great pianist Chucho Valdés digs deeper into the common roots of jazz and Cuban music. A tight collection of songs that span the entire Cuban musical landscape and beyond, Border-Free explores unexpected musical connections.

On his latest album, the guitarist puts his funky jazz-rock stamp on compositions that that nod to Al Green, afro-pop and rhythm & blues, with a couple old collaborators in tow.

Medeski joins host Jon Weber to perform a surprising duet and pieces from his new solo piano album.

Tony DeSare has earned a reputation as one of New York’s hottest young singer/pianists. Whether performing classic standards or sophisticated original compositions, DeSare possesses a cool vocal tone with swinging piano accompaniment. Hear an interview and performance.

The Fourth of July is coming, so we wave the jazz flag with music transcribed from Louis Armstrong’s Hot Fives and Sevens — quintet and septet recordings from the late 1920s — and a new Grammy-winning arrangement of George Gershwin’s “Rhapsody in Blue.”

Montreal is a city of two cultures: French and English, usually commingling, sometimes colliding. The Montreal International Jazz Festival — Canada’s grandest music event of the year — props up the city’s elite Francophones. Here are five French or Quebecois artists featured this year.

As a Japanese expatriate in Berlin, jazz pianist Aki Takase has an outsider’s perspective on jazz and insider wisdom that comes from careful study. Her new album of Duke Ellington tunes reflects influences such as Thelonious Monk and Arnold Schoenberg, as well.

One of the premier interpreters of the Great American Songbook presents a set of timeless music.

Sandoval’s struggles in Cuba have given him the drive to succeed, while helping others learn from jazz. The trumpeter and pianist performs his original tunes “Surena” and “Romantico,” as well as Johnny Green’s “Body and Soul.”

The 23-year-old jazz phenom’s debut album showcases her takes on vintage jazz and blues numbers by Bessie Smith, Fats Waller and others. You can trace some of her effects back to jazz greats like Sarah Vaughan, Betty Carter and Abbey Lincoln.

The jazz composer’s latest project is an opera based on the life of Emile Griffith, a gay boxer who became a world champion in the 1960s — at a price.

Bucky Pizzarelli and his son John have been collaborating since the latter was a kid. They perform live in NPR’s studios.

When a studio engineer and drummer from New Orleans met one of the best trombone players in Richmond, Va., a funky, danceable, street-style brass band was born. Watch 11 musicians squeeze behind NPR Music’s Tiny Desk, turn up the funk and fly the “RVA” flag high.

The banjo player whips up a fresh take on an old-time sound with the help of host Jon Weber.

When he was 21, pianist Marc Cary moved to New York City to find his father. He wound up finding himself in the upper echelons of the city’s jazz scene. Cary’s new album pays tribute to the legendary singer and songwriter with whom he spent more than a decade performing.

Siegel, a singer, is one quarter of the jazz supergroup The Manhattan Transfer. Throughout the 30 years she’s spent with that musical institution, she’s also released her own recordings featuring hip, seductive arrangements of standards, as well as newer works. Here, she visits Piano Jazz along with pianist and accordion player Gil Goldstein.

Though mainly a jazz player, wrote the surf guitar anthem “Walk, Don’t Run,” which became a Top 10 hit for The Ventures on two occasions.

The jazzy, soulful singer challenges himself throughout his latest album, No Beginning, No End.

They met in New Orleans’ performing-arts high school, became Donald Harrison’s rhythm section as teenagers and have now released their first album. The precociously mature collective plays original music — and a few acknowledgements — in a live performance.

The clarinetist Don Byron has a way of homing in on an artist’s legacy and transforming it with intelligence and adventure. He takes on the bluesy music of Southern gospel pioneer Thomas Dorsey with his New Gospel Trio in concert. A precociously mature young band from New Orleans opens.

Hear the late bandleader bring his deft touch to a set of Billy Strayhorn classics and more.

The whole keyboard was Miller’s canvas. His left hand could stride and swing with great authority, and when the two hands got together, he sent the train down the tracks. Hear music from WBGO’s 25th-anniversary party, the Detroit Jazz Festival and the Kennedy Center Jazz Club.

Among the vestment racks, satchel purveyors and art galleries of New York’s SoHo neighborhood lies a small merchant which peddles preserved insects, skulls, bones and other geological findings. Unnerved — well, mostly — the improvising harpist generates a Caribbean bounce amid the glass cases.

The bassist has made the rounds with some of the best jazz musicians in the world, including Wynton Marsalis and Herbie Hancock. But for McBride, staying in the swing of things means reaching audiences. Guest host Celeste Headlee speaks with McBride about his new album, People Music.

Mulder describes bringing new life to old standards and performs a set of the songs she holds dear.

Self-taught and enterprising, Tucker contributed to plenty of great jazz recordings as a sideman in New York and Los Angeles. But the log of his discography barely begins to describe the legacy he left behind in his adopted hometown of Savannah, Ga.

Guest host Michaela Majoun talks to the jazz and blues singer about her new album, The Blue Room.

Vocalist Cecile McLorin Salvant and pianist Aaron Diehl, both in their 20s, have already racked up major industry prizes. They took radically different paths to get there, but on Salvant’s new album, they find ways to honor old traditions as young people.

With the bass, “you have a lot more power than you may think,” Oh says in a session with Jon Weber.

NPR’s Ari Shapiro and others join the Pink Martini co-founder in a journey through popular song.

Among jazz musicians, especially in New York City, Kenny Barron is considered an institution. So it’s fitting that the pianist gets to celebrate his 70th birthday at another New York jazz institution. Here, Barron demonstrates his ebullient clarity in a live video webcast.

Fleck joins host Marian McPartland and bassist Gary Mazzaroppi for trio renditions of “In Walked Bud,” “All the Things You Are” and “Polka Dots and Moonbeams.”

JazzSet celebrates the 70th birthday of NEA Jazz Master Kenny Barron with new duets featuring bassist Dave Holland at the Kennedy Center’s Family Theater. Plus, hear a solo Barron set from the Caramoor Jazz Festival.

A musician who served under Art Blakey, Betty Carter and with the Duke Ellington Orchestra, Miller can be heard on more than 500 albums, including several with his own bands. Beloved by multiple generations of fellow musicians for his commanding, supple style and generous mentorship, he was 57.

Four years after it was recorded live in Lucerne, Switzerland, an album of six standards called Somewhere is finally getting a proper release.

Musically speaking, it’s hard to discern much of a connection to The Rite Of Spring in saxophonist Phil Woods’ Rights Of Swing suite. But in the final “Presto” section, he and his French horn player leave a little Easter egg for us — like many jazz recordings before and after it.

A 100-year-old ballet, composed by a Russian for a French audience, has become something of a standard in an idiom which didn’t exist when it premiered. Whether covered, quoted or praised, Stravinsky’s masterwork has inspired multiple generations of improvisers.

Salvant discusses her journey to discover jazz, and Jon Weber accompanies her in “I Can’t Dance.”

The great composer and bandleader was distraught over the 1967 death of Billy Strayhorn, his songwriting and arranging partner of 28 years. But Ellington took Strayhorn’s passing as an impetus, born of necessity, to increase his own productivity. Here are five examples.

At the Village Vanguard, one flight down from the hubbub of New York City, in a tight space packed with people, we’re about to embark on a musical odyssey by sea. Our captain is saxophonist Chris Potter, who’s launching his Odyssey-inspired album The Sirens.

The two artists are known opposites in the world of instrumental music. On Metheny’s latest, the jazz guitarist wrings an unexpectedly visual listening experience from Zorn’s knotty compositions.

Divine: The Jazz Albums, 1954-1958 packs four CDs with Vaughan’s music, recorded live or in the studio with bands big and small. Two live albums from Chicago nightclubs are standouts, partly when a performance threatens to slide off the rails.

Mahanthappa brings an explosive blend of jazz and South Indian classical music to the studio.