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On every Tuesday in the month of November, NPR's Special Correspondent Susan Stamberg examines how people cope with significant loss, and how they find a way to recover. In her first report, she talks with Leon Fleisher, one of America's premiere pianists, who lost the use of his right hand due to a repetitive motion injury. Instead of giving up music, he began teaching, conducting, and even played concerts featuring music written for just the left hand. Fleisher is now 72 years old, and has undergone numerous treatments to regain the use of his hand. His efforts have paid off, and now select audiences can again listen to this great pianist playing two handed works.

Liane speaks with Jim Sampas, producer of Badlands: A Tribute to Bruce Springsteen's Nebraska, which will be released Tuesday on the Sub Pop label. The Boss's dark and sparse album from 1982 is covered on the new cd by artists including Johnny Cash, Chrissie Hynde, Dar Williams, Ben Harper and others.

Commentator Nat Hentoff looks back at Billie Holiday's 1957 performance of "Fine and Mellow."

Muddy Waters' chart-topping 1954 classic stands today as a keystone of rock 'n' roll.

Opera is the only traditional performance art form with an audience that is getting younger. And some Gen-X fans have found the musical genre via the peculiar route of punk rock. They're drawn by opera's high drama, high volume and intellectual challenge. NPR's Neda Ulaby reports.

Jeff Lunden tells the story of "Oklahoma!" The musical, which premiered in 1943, and was expected to flop. But it didn't.

Cage's "intense" musical composition consists of a pianist sitting at a piano and playing nothing.

Written by Bobby Troup and performed by Nat King Cole, the song immortalized Route 66.

Liane Hansen speaks with Jerry Bock and Sheldon Harnick who wrote the lyrics and music for Fiddler on the Roof which opened on Broadway in September 1964.

Susan Stamberg profiles the musical's lyricist, her dear friend, Edward Kleban.