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Award-winning double-bassist and composer Edgar Meyer, 42, describes his music.

Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead pays tribute to Fats Waller on the centennial of his birth, and reviews Fats Waller: The Centennial Collection, a CD and DVD.

Since Sunday is Mother's Day, we took the opportunity to talk with a well-known musical mother and her daughter about how they share music. Pianist Wu Han, and her husband, cellist David Finckel, live with their daughter, Lillian, in New York. Lillian is 10 years old and has been playing piano for several years, and she just started playing violin. Fred talks with mother and daughter about their relationship. Then, from a concert at Union College in Schenectady, New York, we hear Lillian's parents play the Cello Sonata No. 4, by Beethoven.

Just in time for the start of summer, the Helsinki-based surf rock band Laika & the Cosmonauts visits NPR to perform live. NPR's Liane Hansen talks with members of the group.

On her latest album, Between Here and Gone, Mary Chapin Carpenter sings the true story of one man's pilgrimage to Grand Central Terminal in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks.

Rapper Mike Skinner is Britain's version of the hip-hop star, but his second CD is more soap opera than thug life. Known as "The Streets," Skinner tells an entire story from start to end, involving girls, drugs, and returning video rentals. Critic Will Hermes a review the new CD, A Grand Don't Come for Free.

Guitarist and singer Marty Grosz and cornet player Randy Reinhart join us for a special in-studio performance in honor of the 100th birthday of Thomas "Fats" Waller. He would have been 100 on May 21. Grosz and Reinhart will perform songs composed by the great pianist and vocalist. Waller wrote many hit songs, appeared in films in the 1930s and 1940s, and wrote Broadway musicals. Some of his best-loved songs include "Ain't Misbehavin'," "Honeysuckle Rose" and "The Joint is Jumpin'." There's a new CD/DVD set called Fats Waller: The Centennial Collection on Bluebird Records.

Jamaican pianist Monty Alexander and guitarist Ernest Ranglin are old friends, countrymen and music legends. NPR's Liane Hansen talks to them about their music — and they perform jazz tracks from their latest CD collaboration.

After five decades of pop hits, Neil Sedaka is preparing for a Carnegie Hall concert of Yiddish music. NPR's Scott Simon talks with the entertainer about his lengthy career and return to his musical Jewish roots.

Producer Jack Chance of Hearing Voices takes a trip to remote Easter Island to record some of the local music. He hears stories about how the island's famous stone heads, called moai, were arrayed around the perimeter of the island many centuries ago.