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Praised for the fluidity he brings to Chopin, Chinese pianist Yundi Li is getting rave reviews for his latest interpretation of Franz Liszt's Piano Concerto No. 1. He joined the National Symphony Orchestra this week for three performances of the concerto.

Chicago-based jazz singer Kurt Elling consistently gets the top spot in music magazine polls for Best Male Vocalist. His new album Nightmoves, is his first for the Concord Jazz label.

Singer-songwriter Neil Sedaka, who marks his 50th anniversary in the music business this year, helped create what's known as the Brill Building sound in the late '50s and early '60s. He's been inducted into the Songwriter's Hall of Fame, but he got his start as a classical pianist. He joins Terry Gross to talk about his life as a performer — and about The Definitive Collection, a career-spanning greatest-hits compendium.

A new CD features a unique musical combination from Ghana: drums, singing, bells and squeeze-bulb horns. The band members are taxi and truck drivers, and their music, por por, is named after the sound their horns make.

Singer, musician and folklorist Mick Moloney's album, McNally's Row of Flats, centers on theater songs by an Irish songwriting team from the late 1800s. The team consisted of actor and writer Ed Harrigan and musician David Braham, both acclaimed performers of the early Great White Way.

The Stooges rock band, led by singer Iggy Pop, have just released their first album in almost 35 years. It's called The Weirdness.

It's a truism that the drum is the heart and soul of African music. But not so fast: Over the past century, guitarists have redefined the sound of the continent. Two new releases, by Zimbabwean guitarist Louis Mhlanga and a Toronto-based group called the African Guitar Summit, prove that.

Brazilian singer Ceu loves soul, jazz, hip-hop and afro-pop. And those influences are apparent on her new self-titled CD. But the foundation underlying it all is the Brazilian samba. "It's what sticks to the soles of my feet, " she says.

Grammy-winning singer and songwriter Lucinda Williams has released her eighth CD, West. The collaboration with producer Hal Willner is mostly a meditation on the death of Williams' mother, and the end of a turbulent love affair.

The songs of singer-songwriter Patty Griffin are full of heartbreak and longing — so much so that a friend recently challenged her to write a happy song. She discusses that song and her new CD, Children Running Through.