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As a teenager, the singer-songwriter was already touring the world with his rock band. His new album takes him back to before then, when country music blasted out of Texas radio stations. He performs a solo acoustic set in NPR's Studio 4A.

The soulful pop singer was working as a waitress at the start of 2008, but it didn't take her long to grab a spot as the opening act for Robert Plant, Alison Krauss and T-Bone Burnett on their Raising Sand tour. Though she might be called an overnight sensation, Little has been honing her bluesy, jazzy style for years.

When it comes to playing Chopin, pianist Arthur Rubinstein had poetry in his soul. His expressive recordings brim with warmth, lyricism and spontaneity, as if he were approaching Chopin's long-spun melodies and turbulent emotions for the very first time.

Case has one of those huge, powerful voices that pulls you in and swirls you around, kind of like a tornado. For her latest album, Middle Cyclone, Case filled a barn with pianos, recorded the sounds of tree frogs and channeled a lovestruck tornado. Here, Case discusses the process of writing Middle Cyclone and working with her other band, The New Pornographers.

A man of many monikers, the ever-prolific Will Oldham is set to release a new album as Bonnie "Prince" Billy. He recently visited WNYC's Soundcheck, where he impressed the staff with his musicality — and, it turns out, his knowledge of old Westerns.

Wilson's Loverly won the 2009 Grammy for Best Jazz Vocal Album. With a wide variety of standards — from "St. James Infirmary" to "Til There Was You" — she stretches out on Loverly at the Chicago Symphony Center.

Violinist Anne-Sophie Mutter bares her soul in a searing, sometimes angry, beautiful performance of Brahms' Violin Concerto, recorded live and dedicated to her late husband.

Long a standout purveyor of rootsy, direct "heartland" rock, Mellencamp is in the midst of a folksy, pessimistic streak on his new album. He speaks to host Terry Gross about the spare sound and dark themes of Life, Death, Love and Freedom.

The South Carolina "kid rock" trio Lunch Money has a new CD out titled Dizzy. The group's hook-filled melodies and indie-pop arrangements have a familiar appeal to kids and adults alike.

Clever but not cloying, "Top of the Bottom" documents a pop singer's rise, rapid decline and resurrection to a more mundane new beginning. Harding tells a funny and gripping story about the margins of pop music, while providing a surprisingly convincing look at how and where dreams of stardom often end.