Music & Culture

Mumford & Sons (from left: Ben Lovett, Marcus Mumford, Ted Dwane and Winston Marshall) accept the award for album of the year at the Grammy Awards on Sunday night.

Music & Culture

Mumford & Sons Take Home Album Of The Year Grammy

12:25pm February 11, 2013

by Jacob Ganz

Call it diversity or a lack of consensus, but no single act dominated this year's awards. Instead, the Grammys spread the love, though rock bands — including The Black Keys and fun. — fared well.

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Doris Day's somber 1958 version of "Hooray for Hollywood," which was included on an album of the same name, better reflects the song's creatively complicated lyrics.

Hollywood's 'Hooray': Hardly A Happy Hymn

11:41am February 11, 2013

by Susan Stamberg

It's Oscar season, meaning that classic toe-tapper "Hooray for Hollywood" will soon be booming out of TV speakers everywhere. But the cheery cinema hymn has a more complicated compositional past, as NPR's special correspondent Susan Stamberg explains.

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Singer Frank Ocean accepts Best Urban Contemporary Album award for Channel Orange.

Play-By-Play: Read Along With The Grammy Awards

1:11am February 11, 2013

by Stephen Thompson

For the fifth straight year, whether marveling at Taylor Swift's capacity for surprise or trying to figure out what to type during the combined 37 minutes of Bruno Mars performances, Linda Holmes and Stephen Thompson live-blogged the ceremony in an effort to serve your reading-along needs.

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Argentinean singer Lucio Arce plays tango in the classic style.

Music & Culture

New Tango Favorites From 'Global Village'

10:58pm February 10, 2013

by NPR Staff

Hear world music DJ Betto Arcos' picks from Argentinean and Uruguayan artists.

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Frank Ocean performs at the MTV Video Music Awards in September 2012.

Music & Culture

Frank Ocean's Big Year, And What Hasn't Changed In Hip-Hop

12:11pm February 09, 2013

by Sam Sanders

Ocean's six Grammy nominations round out a year in which his sexuality was as big a topic as his music.

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After their album went to No. 1 on iTunes, Macklemore sent out the following tweet.

Music & Culture

The Real Story Of How Macklemore Got 'Thrift Shop' To No. 1

7:09pm February 08, 2013

by Zoe Chace

Macklemore and Ryan Lewis, a rap group out of Seattle, say they rose to the top without a label. That's not entirely true.

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Justin Bieber on stage in December. Bieber's 2012 album Believe, despite selling over 1,000,000 copies, wasn't nominated for a single Grammy Award.

Music & Culture

Why Al Walser Got A Grammy Nomination And Justin Bieber Didn't

4:49pm February 08, 2013

by Mandalit del Barco

The voting rules for the awards almost always leave room for disappointment or confusion, but if you're willing to market yourself, you too could win a nomination.

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Lena Hughes recorded one album of Southern parlor music before her death in 1998.

Music & Culture

The 'Ancient Vibration' Of Parlor Music, Revived By Two Generations

9:29am February 07, 2013

by Joel Rose

A voice from a bygone era, Lena Hughes was never very famous outside of her native Missouri. The only album she ever recorded has been saved from near-oblivion, and it acts as a kind of time capsule.

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Jazz clarinetist Anat Cohen has a new album out called Claroscuro.

Music & Culture

Anat Cohen: Bringing The Clarinet To The World

4:28pm February 06, 2013

On her latest album, Claroscuro, the jazz clarinetist explores influences that range from Louis Armstrong to Brazilian music to that of her native Israel. It's this desire to adapt the instrument to so many musical traditions that has earned Cohen such acclaim.

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Music & Culture

Reissued And Relevant, Marcos Valle's '70s Bossa Nova Returns

6:36pm February 05, 2013

by Will Hermes

Four of the Brazilian singer-songwriter's classic records are being re-released this week. Critic Will Hermes says that, while the music is steeped in a political climate of the past, they still resonate with the present.

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