Search results for

This week's Take Five skips from the provinces of Quebec and Ottawa over to British Columbia, featuring a jazz legend, a world-famous vocalist/pianist and a few Canadian musicians who are gaining wider recognition outside their home country. Listen to five songs below.

It's no secret that Cajun and zydeco music is all about sweat. So you can go to Louisiana for a summertime steambath, or you can bring a bit of the heat to you. Here are five songs guaranteed to get your feet moving, at which point the sweating part will take care of itself.

Jazz icon Louis Armstrong didn't just leave behind a treasure trove of musical recordings; he also documented hundreds of his private conversations on tape. Those recordings served as the basis for Terry Teachout's new biography of the legendary musician, Pops: A Life of Louis Armstrong.

No, no — the headline's not referring to you. Heaven forbid. But people like you listen to a lot of cool and/or unusual music, and refuse to sample the good stuff right under their noses because it's "mainstream." It's best not to think these hipsters omniscient — after all, there's lots of great music they're too cool to notice. Here are 10 examples from 2009.

In a ceremony held Tuesday at Jazz at Lincoln Center in New York, the National Endowment for the Arts presented the country's highest awards for jazz artistry and advocacy. Hear a recording of the entire event, featuring the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra.

The early stages of 2011 have already seen new jazz records inspired by the civil rights movement, scored for a New Orleans trio and rearranging an underrated drummer's music. Hear music from Marcus Shelby, Plunge, Joel Harrison and the Horo label.

During the 1940s and '50s, Dameron focused his considerable compositional talents on the emerging jazz style called bebop. During a relatively brief period, Dameron composed a body of work that helped define and expand the parameters of this music.

The traditions of Mardi Gras are a huge part of New Orleans' cultural identity. Hear five artists whose music you might find playing on the streets of the Crescent City during Mardi Gras.

We're now a decade into the 21st century, so it's time to check in on the blues and see how it's doing in the relatively new world of loops, samples and remixing technology.

Growing up in Denver, Rudy and Shamie Royston dreamed about moving to a jazz hub like New York. After a few welcome delays to teach and raise a family, they're beginning to pursue careers as performing musicians.