Soundcheck

The singer Meklit, born Meklit Hadero in Ethiopia, is based in the Bay Area, where she has released a number of albums that blend jazz, pop, and soul with the echoes of Ethiopian pop. Her latest album, A Piece of Infinity, finds Meklit singing mostly in Amharic, and looking back to what is sometimes called the Golden Age of Ethiopian music – the time in the early 70s when Latin music, American funk, and traditional Ethiopian scales and rhythms all came together. Meklit and her band perform some of these new songs, in-studio. 1. Ambassel 2. Tizita 3. Geefata

Canadian singer and composer Patrick Watson has been making records for almost a quarter century – with a cinematic blend of indie rock, cabaret pop, and chamber music that has made him a favorite of film directors and music supervisors.  His latest record, Uh Oh, is the result of a pretty big uh-oh moment for a singer: Watson lost his voice. He thought it was broken forever, and wrote a collection of songs and collaborations with other people - voices that he wanted to hear: among them the artists Charlotte Cardin, La Force, Martha Wainwright, and Klô Pelgag. Luckily, Watson managed to get his voice back;  he performs in-studio with his frequent collaborator, the singer/songwriter La Force.Set List: 1. Lonely Nights 2. Peter and the Wolf 3. House on Fire

American indie rock band The Antlers began almost 20 years ago as a solo project from singer and songwriter Peter Silberman. While the previous album, Green To Gold, was a pastoral, almost folky affair, the new album, Blight, is almost like a classical song cycle, and is a musical warning about nature under siege.  “The consequences of accelerating technology and environmental neglect feel imminent; that sense of urgency made me want to speak more candidly,” he explains (Transgressive Records). Silberman and longtime Antlers drummer Michael Lerner play some of these new songs, in-studio. Set list: 1. Consider the Source 2. Calamity 3. A Great Flood

GRAMMY-winning musical omnivore Sullivan Fortner merges New Orleans grit and spice with invention (and not just J.S. Bach), for an alchemical jazz that is wise, feisty, mischievous, and dynamic. His exposure to R&B, soul, and gospel at home; his time at Oberlin and the influence of various teachers in jazz and classical disciplines; and his longtime collaborator Cécile McLorin Salvant have all informed his approach to writing and playing, with an emphasis on PLAY. Fortner is the inaugural Bell Jazz Award Winner, and he performs tunes from early blues and jazz, a version of a Chopin waltz, and his own original music, in-studio. Set list: 1. Grandpa's Spells (Jelly Roll Morton) 2. It's A Game 3. Chopin's Valse Du Petit Chien

The Spanish-born singer, songwriter and producer Pablopablo recently released his debut LP, but he’d already built up an impressive array of writing and producing credits, winning Latin Grammys back in 2022 under his given name, Pablo Drexler. Those awards were for his work on a collaboration between his father, the popular Uruguayan-born musician Jorge Drexler, and the Spanish superstar C. Tangana. And collaboration is an important part of Pablopablo’s music as well, as you’ll hear on his record, Canciones En Mi. Pablopablo plays solo, and with guest musician Macario Martinez, in-studio.  Set list: 1. Todavia 2. Vida Nueva 3. Ojos de Ajonjoli

Christone "Kingfish" Ingram has been steeped in the Blues since he was eight years old, when he visited the Delta Blues Museum as a student in Clarksdale, Mississippi (Jackson Advocate). He played drums, bass, and GUITAR and was recognized at a young age for his exceptional musical talent with his debut album Kingfish, in 2019 on Alligator Records. Since then he’s released two more albums, won a Grammy and a shelfful of Blues Music Awards, and he’s still just 26. His raw and inspired guitar playing, soulful vocals and mature songwriting, bandleading, mentoring younger musicians, and starting his own record label have led Christone “Kingfish” Ingram to be “the face of a new generation of blues artists” (Fender). Christone "Kingfish" Ingram and his band play songs from the new album, called Hard Road, in-studio. Set list: 1. Voodoo Charm 2. Bad Like Me 3. Nothin' But Your Love 

“Shamstep” band, 47SOUL, take their name from the Arabic name for the Levant region – Bilad al-Sham, with members from Jordan, Washington DC, and Israel - spanning the divides of the Palestinian Diaspora. The music is a mix of dubstep, hip-hop and electro-Arabic dabke with lyrics in both Arabic and English, which are intensely political in their call for celebration and freedom in the struggle for equality. The quartet 47SOUL performs their smart dance music in-studio. (From the Archives, 2019.)Set list: 1. Don’t care where you’re from 2. Moved Around  3. Intro To Shamstep 

The Hypnotic Brass Ensemble is a musically free-ranging band of brothers from the south side of Chicago. Their music draws from funk, funky jazz, Afrobeat, hip hop, rock, reggae, and R&B, and they’ve performed with Tony Allen, Wu Tang Clan, De La Soul, Prince, Femi Kuti, Gorillaz, Yasiin Bey (aka Mos Def), and the B52's, to name a few. Growing up, the members of HBE were raised with music as a constant, as they are the sons of the late jazz trumpeter Phil Cohran (Earth, Wind, and Fire, Sun Ra Arkestra). Now based between Brooklyn and Chicago, the full party of Hypnotic Brass Ensemble plays some tunes in-studio. (Archives, 2019)Set list:  1. Menage 2. War 3. ACF

Rumbo Tumba is the project of the Argentine musician Facundo Salgado, who uses a looping station and a battery of handmade, traditional South American instruments to create brilliant musical conversations between South American traditions and modern technology.  Rumbo Tumba can make an improbable amount of sound, live and alone, constructing sounds and atmospheres that transport listeners to the purest places in nature. Hear his live in-studio set for us and his explanation of how he makes all this music live. Rumbo Tumba plays in New York at Public Records on October 10.Set list: 1. Monte 2. Barro 3. Huguaju

From the 2025 New York Guitar Festival, hear music from legendary American jazz guitarist Bill Frisell and Icelandic bass player Skúli Sverrisson, who were about to go into the studio and record their second album as a duo. Part of the New Sounds Live concerts, the music was recorded at the First Unitarian Congregational Society in Brooklyn, and was a co-presentation of World Music Institute. Set list: 1. Sverrisson: Her Room 2. Sverrisson: Draumfari 3. Frisell: Baby 4. Sverrisson: Afternoon Variant