Audio by artist larry_kensington

This week's Nightmix is a straightforward celebration of Christmas. Familiar carols are combined with modern songs and certain oddball but festive selections.

Thsi week's program is a straightforward celebration of Christmas, with appropriate music and a couple of poems.

The first hour of the first Nightmix of 2010 imparts the lesson that great virtuosity is about much more than playing a lot of notes at blazing speed. Classical pianist Lang Lang plays Chinese folk melodies. Guitarists Adrian Legg and Jimi Hendrix show their great ability to play pretty. And a very good Eastern European orchestra plays movie music inspired by the most popular wizard since Merlin.

The music called "new grass" is best described as bluegrass with a postmodern attitude, and one of its finest groups, the Greencards, starts things off in the second hour of this week's "Nightmix." Other music includes some of the traditional country and jazz sounds that have influenced new grass.

For close to 40 years, Vangelis has been one of the most consistently original voices in ambient and new age music. Tonight's second hour features some of his best from the 1970s and 1990s.

Fiddler Jay Ungar and guitarist Molly Mason are not just husband and wife--they're the undisputed first couple of American roots music. In the first hour of this week's program, they play a couple of their trademark waltzes as well as a couple of swing tunes from the 1930s. You'll also hear two outstanding Canadian groups that give fresh perspective to older music--the Susie Arioli Band from Montreal and the Nova Scotian group Great Big Sea.

How's this for covering a lot of different ground in the 58 or so minutes allotted? The beauty and power of spirituals are captured in performances by two very seasoned jazzmen, bassist Charlie Haden and pianist Hank Jones. The godfathers of Celtic music, the Chieftains, play Irish and Scottish dances. Guitar legend Eric Clapton plays unplugged, and Hungarian classical pianist Zoltan Kocsis shows his affinity for French impressionism.

This week's first hour brings together European, American, and Canadian jazz and new age performances. Some very special music comes from the British Isles: two sides by the Beatles, including one of their greatest chart-toppers; and two very lyrical classical works played by the eminent clarinetist Emma Johnson.

When Johnny Cash died in September 2003, the New York Times ran a page-one obituary with a headline referring to Cash as "Country Music Bedrock." In this hour of Nightmix, you'll hear two fine examples of what made the Man in Black so rock-solid for so long. Two other "bedrock" performers of their style of music, jazz, Wes Montgomery and Bill Evans, demonstrate their distinctive styles.

It's a pretty incredible story: two young Mexican guitarists who started out playing thrash metal in their homeland left to settle in Ireland, and there made a name for themselves playing a distinctive brand of fast, highly rhythmic acoustic music inspired by classic rock and jazz fusion. Rodrigo & Gabriela light up the first hour of this week's program, as does another incredible virtuoso with a worldwide following, cellist Yo-Yo Ma. There's also a touch of Celtic music, a famous cinematic love theme, and two late 60's hits by a onetime protegee of Paul McCartney.

Italian pianist/composer Ludovico Einaudi was a star pupil at the Milan Conservatory in the early 1970s, well on the way to a standard career in classical music until he decided to start writing down and playing the "other" music he was hearing in his head. Today he is writing and recording what is perhaps Europe's most elegant and substantial "minimalist" music. You'll get some samples of it in this hour, along with some of the nuevo flamenco guitar of Ottmar Liebert and two of the classic reggae tunes of Bob Marley..

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart packed much living and composing into his 35 years of life. He wrote his first keyboard music when he was just 6 years old, and began his remarkable string of 27 piano concertos as a young teenager. Tonight's first hour features a charming early Mozart concerto played by the acclaimed Murray Perahia. Other music includes two of jazz's most distinguished tenor saxophonists, Stanley Turrentine and John Coltrane.

One critic said, "They make demented, postmodern mountain music." According to another, "They've figured out how to hold a hoedown in a physics lab." They met and began making music together when they were students at Cornell University, and at least one of them was a physics major. They're the Horse Flies, and their quirkily modifed roots music begins this hour of the program. You'll also hear from some other quirky but memorable musicains, including Leon Redbone, Paul Desmond, and the late singer/songwriter Vic Chesnutt.

Guitarists figure prominently in this week's first hour: Al DiMeola, Alex De Grassi, and Jeff Linsky bring you three very distinct approaches to playing the instrument. And a pair of pianists, Keith Jarrett and Mikhail Pletnev, cover the Great American Songbook and the Italian baroque.

The best singers, whether they perform in the opera house or the neighborhood bar, always place their gifts in the service of the music they sing. One of the best at doing  that is Broadway, pop, and jazz singer Maureen McGovern, who in this hour will deliver two textbook examples of how a singer is really a songwriter's messenger. You'll also hear some gorgeous classical music for string orchestra, an Eastern European jazz bassist who plays with great soul and abandon, and a couple of pop hits of the 1960s.

For more than 40 years, Rod Stewart has been using his trademark raspy voice to cover everything from hard rock to folk-influenced pop to the Great American Songbook. This hour features two of his most successful tunes from the early portion of his solo career. There's Bach to go along with that rock, as French pianist Helene Grimaud covers two of the Baroque master's well-known themes. Add to that some West Coast jazz, some Celtic fiddling, and two tunes from South America, and you've got enough variety to keep the hour fairly interesting. Enjoy!

He's usually called the "Father of the Symphony," but Austrian composer Franz Joseph Haydn didn't really invent the form. What he did do was give a new shape and depth to the symphony, turning it into a kind of repository for a composer's most important ideas. He began doing that in the very earliest of his 100-plus symphonies. Movements from three early Haydn symphonies figure prominently in this week's second hour. You'll also get to sample the jazz piano of Cincinnati native Fred Hersch, the sound of Native American flute, and a lullaby recorded outdoors in the Grand Canyon.

Jeri Southern was a very accomplished jazz singer who started out as a classical pianist and, after just a decade of recording jazz, left the business to teach and then became successful as a composer/arranger in Hollywood. Some of her best jazz sides frrom the mid- to late 1950s have been recently reissued, and we'll hear a few of them in this hour. Also featured is the maverick master of steel-string guitar, John Fahey.

The Belgian native Jean-Baptiste Frederic Isidor Thielemans, better known as "Toots," has been playing jazz for close to 70 years, first as a guitarist and then as a harmonica virtuoso, which is how he got his nickname. In tonight's first hour, you'll hear first-rate performances by Toots Thielemans on both the instruments he's mastered. We'll also mark the 40th anniversary of the release of one of Elton John's best albums, the American-West-themed "Tumbleweed Connection."

The Irish/American group Nightnoise was a primary force in the 1980s and 90s in the fusion of Celtic music with elements of jazz and classical chamber music, as evidenced in the couple of pieces you'll get to enjoy in this hour. The rest of the fare ranges from Italian Renaissance music to jazz accordion to the mellow Americanism of singer/guitarist James Taylor.

For more than 25 years, new age multi-instrumentalist/composer David Arkenstone has been crafting music for movies and TV, and more recently, even for computer games. This hour features three pieces from one of his most recent recordings.

Sacred and secular Americana predominate in this week's first hour. The a cappella group Anonymous 4 lends its pure sound and exquisite musicianship to religious songs from the 18th and 19th centuries; Texas jazz pianist Charles Brown lends his soft, swinging touch to the blues; and Bela Fleck, George Winston, and Miles Davis add their distinctive contributions.

Featured artists on this week's program include the Twelve Girls Band from China, British folk singer/songwriter/guitarist Martin Simpson, and jazz saxophonist Branford Marsalis (playing French classical music).

Jazz old and new is a prominent element in this week's program. The old comes from Dodo Marmarosa, one of the most brilliant pianists to come out of the bebop era; the new from Jaimee Paul, a high-powered singer from the capital of country music, Nashville. In the second hour, you'll also be treated to the sounds of Native American instruments and Shaker tunes.

There's a good deal of globetrotting going on with this week's program. The stops are in Latin America, Turkey, Western Africa, Italy, Scotland, Japan, and the good ol' US of A. The artists range from a master oud player to a pioneering soul singer to a world-class string quartet.

This week's amalgam of sounds includes selections from one of new age pianist Liz Story's best records; the vocal magic of two different all-male choruses from San Francisco; jazz from a great European bassist affectionately known as NHOP (which is not a place to get pancakes); and a couple of tunes from the Beatles' "White Album."

The folk piano of George Winston forms the centerpiece of this week's program, which includes other folkish sounds by Bob Dylan, Jesse Colin Young, and Simon and Garfunkel. There are also performances by Vince Guaraldi, Paul Desmond, and the new age duo of Eric Tingstad and Nancy Rumbel.

Beautiful straight-ahead jazz and covers of Beatles' tunes are the main items in this week's melange of mellow sounds. You'll also hear some of the down-home bass playing of the classically trained Edgar Meyer; the new age piano of Peter Kater; and a couple of tunes written by one of the true poets of country music, Townes van Zandt.

The sounds you'll hear this week run the gamut from Celtic harp to new age piano, from the keyboard sonatas of Domenico Scarlatti to the melodies of Hoagy Carmichael, Leonard Cohen, and John Lennon.

The superb musicianship and sweet, clear soprano voice of Canada's Loreena McKennitt, whose music interestingly combines elements of Celtic and Middle Eastern music, are prominently featured in this week's program, along with the fingerpicking prowess of guitarist Leo Kottke.

Alt-country guru and Ohio native Buddy Miller got himself and three of his guitar-playing friends together in 2010 to form the Majestic Silver Strings, a group dedicated to giving old country tunes a new twist. Selections from the group's 2011 release are the bedrock of this edition of the program. You'll also hear two classics by Patsy Cline, an instrumental selection by Rodney Crowell, and some memorable non-country sounds by Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass, The Horse Flies, and Acoustic Alchemy.

Late last year, jazz guitarist Pat Metheny did his first-ever solo recording made up completely of music he didn't compose. Instead he covered, affectionately and with great insight, tunes he heard on the radio when he was coming of age in the 1960s and early 70s. Hear Metheny treat tunes originally made popular by the Beatles, the Association, and Carly Simon. You'll also hear standards done by another marquee jazz artist, Diana Krall, as well as new age sounds by Enya and Vangelis. Topping things off are sides from the seminal British folk-rock group, Fairport Convention.

The 10-man vocal ensemble from South Africa, Ladysmith Black Mambazo, bring their close, soulful harmonies to this week's program. You'll also enjoy traditional music from Canada and the US. The American music was included in the soundtrack for Ken Burns's 2009 PBS documentary "The National Parks."

Something old, something new. The old is very old: it's medieval music, played by an acclaimed British early music ensemble called Trouvere. The new is the latest recording from bluegrass star Alison Krauss and Union Station. You'll also hear selections from "Raising Sand," the Grammy-winning CD of 2009 that brought Krauss together with Robert Plant, the former lead singer for Led Zeppelin.

From the heyday of the singer-songwriter, the 1960s and early 70s, come tunes by two of the best from the era: Gordon Lightfoot and Bob Dylan. There are also excerpts form Mike Oldfield's pioneering progressive rock recording "Tubular Bells," and some current Oldfield-influenced music by a new age group from Finland.

One of the continuing acknowledgements of the greatness of Johann Sebastian Bach's music is how well it lends itself to all manner of arrangement and transcription. This week the Jacques Loussier Trio offers remarkable jazz treatments of two of the Brandenburg Concertos. You'll also be treated to some of the "Water Music" by Bach's illustrious contemporary, George Frideric Handel (as Handel wrote it); transcriptions for guitar of French piano music; the lovely voice of Eva Cassidy; and a couple of tunes by an enterprising indie band from Sweden.

Latino music is widely popular across the contemporary world. The seeds of that popularity were sown in the late 1960s by such performers as Puerto Rican native Jose Feliciano. You'll hear a few tunes from Feliciano's breakthrough year of 1968 on this week's program. Much of the rest of this week's music comes from the north--from Canadian guitarist Jesse Cook and the all-female group the Wailin' Jennys, and from Jeff Pianki, an engaging singer-songwriter from Michigan. There's also some warm, atmospheric piano music from sunny Italy.

Tenor saxophonist Stan Getz and trumpeter Clifford Brown are among the jazz greats, and some of the finest performances by each await you this week. Offsetting and complementing those cool and boppish sounds are the contemplative piano of Sarah Modene and a touch of ragtime.

This week Scottish classical guitarist David Russell treats you to the delights of English and Italian Renaissance music, and the guitar duo of Tommy Emmanuel and Frank Vignola treat items from the Great American Songbook. There are also a few late 60s hits by the Canadian group The Guess Who, and acoustic selections from a recent compilation called "Women of the World."

Paul McCartney turned 70 this past June. His latest album, called "Kisses on the Bottom," is a collection of standards, tunes McCartney first heard and internalized as he was growing up in his musical household in Liverpool, England, and that later informed some of the finest songs he wrote during his days with the Beatles. Some of those standards and a couple of Beatles' items are featured on this week's program. Other sounds are from the Irish band Altan; movie music by Vangelis; and individual tunes from The Hot Club of Cowtown, Jay Ungar and Molly Mason, and the Tord Gustavsen Trio.

Celebrate Christmas and the Winter Solstice with this special hour of music and poetry.

For more than 40 years, mandolin virtuoso David "Dawg" Grisman has been a tireless advocate of acoustic music, performing all over the world in bluegrass, jazz, classical, and pop settings. This week, the Dawg shines in duets with Jerry Garcia, Martin Taylor, and Denny Zeitlin. Our year-end hour of sweet sounds also includes memorable tunes by Simon and Garfunkel and from the group Ayreheart, led by lutenist Ronn McFarlane. Rounding out the program are a couple of little piano tone poems from a compilation on the Narada label.

The first program of the new year carries with it a touch of timelessness: two lovely slow movements from piano concertos by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. You'll also hear the amazing tapping technique of jazz guitarist Stanley Jordan; jazz piano by Gene Harris; and the remarkable melding of eastern and western influences by the group Vas.

This is a repeat of the program first broadcast on 10/15/2012. It features Buddy Miller's The Majestic Silver Strings.

Both Rufus Wainwright and Dar Williams are singer/songwriters who have received consistent critical praise for their work. This week you'll hear selections from their latest releases.

Sometimes, when two recording artists who have never gotten together to play before finally do, the result sounds so natural and good that you wonder why they waited so long to collaborate. Pat Metheny and Brad Mehldau worked their collective magic in 2009, and that CD is featured this week. You'll also hear ambient music from Israel, some Shaker tunes, and sides by Rikki Lee Jones and fiddler Elana James.

Tunisian native Anouar Brahem is a master of the oud. This week you'll hear how Brahem melds the practices of North African and Near Eastern music with the sounds of jazz and classic Arab music to create a carefully layered, deeply soulful sound. You'll also enjoy songs by Randy Newman and Leonard Cohen, as well as the distinctive jazz guitar of Wes Montgomery.

The string quartet has been called the "royal discipline" of chamber music, and the man primarily responsible for establishing the form's high status was the prolific 18th-century Austrian, Franz Joseph Haydn. Movements from Haydn quartets are the warm core of this week's program, which also includes fine performances by the Mexican guitar duo Rodrigo y Gabriela, James Taylor, and Neil Young.

The 12 Girls Band from China plays Eastern and Western music on traditional Chinese instruments, and plays with rare vitality and verve. This week you'll also hear new age treatments of Beatles tunes, a capella singing by Anonymous 4, and the jazz-inflected sounds of Philadelphia native Melody Gardot.

This week's mellow variety comprises medieval chant and Renaissance brass music from England; several sides by one of the most important acts to come out of the 1960s Greenwich Village folk scene, Peter Paul, and Mary; and two sides from the most recent recording by the 21-year-old Texas native, mandolinist and singer Sarah Jarosz.

Dick Gaughan is one of the British Isles' most versatile and accomplished folk musicians. He's a virtuoso guitarist, a respected music critic, and has been commissioned to compose music for orchestra. This week you'll hear Gaughan's treatment of a couple of traditional tunes as well as one of his own. You'll also get a pleasant earful of peaceful piano music.

Algerian-born French guitarist Pierre Bensusan has been playing and recording his special brand of acoustic music since he was 17. It blends elements of Celtic and French traditional music with the rhythms and inflections of jazz and the Near East, and you'll get to sample some of it on this program. Also included are richly layered sounds from the ambient music group Grain Space, and the pure country sounds of Emmylou Harris and the forever-iconic Hank Williams.

When the Beatles founded Apple Records in 1968, it was with the hope of discovering, signing, and nurturing new talent. Among the artists signed in the label's early days were Billy Preston, Mary Hopkin, James Taylor, and Badfinger. You'll get a sizable helping of those early Apple sides on this week's program. Other sweet sounds are by Irish musician Phil Coulter and Belgian jazz harmonica virtuoso Toots Thielemans.

The Wailin' Jennys, an all-female trio from Manitoba, have become known for their pure, beautiful harmonies and for writing songs informed by American and Canadian folk traditions. Their sweet sound forms the centerpiece of this week's program. Also included are baroque and new age sounds from Germany, and some jazz from both ends of the 1960s.

In the first half of the 1960s, the Vanguard record label was home to a major gathering of enormously talented folk singers and musicians. This week you'll get to enjoy some of those important recordings, done by Joan Baez, Doc Watson, Mississippi John Hurt, Tom Paxton, Eric Anderson, and Patrick Sky. Other music is by the pioneering jazz fusion group Oregon and by the duo of Eric Tingstad and Nancy Rumbel.

This week's program features music requested by listeners, including tunes by Simon and Garfunkel and the acoustic jazz guitar of Jeff Linsky. Other music is from the Susie Arioli Band, Leo Kottke, and the jazz duo of pianist Fred Hersch and guitarist Bill Frisell.

Piano music is prominent on this week's program. Gloria Cheng plays contemporary pieces by Terry Riley and John Adams, and John Bayless plays his impassioned transcriptions of operatic arias by Giacomo Puccini. We'll also travel back 50 years to hear some remarkable jazz singing by Chillicothe native Nancy Wilson.

This all-instrumental edition of the program includes selections from the latest recording by the Brad Mehldau Trio.

This week Scottish classical guitarist David Russell treats you to the delights of English and Italian Renaissance music, and the guitar duo of Tommy Emmanuel and Frank Vignola treat items from the Great American Songbook. There are also a few late 60s hits by the Canadian group The Guess Who, and acoustic selections from a recent compilation called "Women of the World."

Simone Dinnerstein is a classical pianist best known for the way she plays Bach. Tift Merritt is a singer-songwriter influenced by Joni Mitchell, Leonard Cohen, and traditional American music. When the two women met in 2009, they realized they wanted to collaborate on a musical project, no matter what. The result, a recording called "Night," is front and center on this edition of the program. There is also jazz by Wynton Marsalis and his father, Ellis, as well as electronic fare by the group Frozen Silence.

KENSINGTON’S PREMIUM BLEND
Program 001 Playlist

Clarinet Blue
Bobby Gordon w/Dave McKenna
Clarinet Blue
Arbors Records ARCD 19223

When I’m Sixty-Four
The Beatles
Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band
Apple Records/Capitol 5745530

Dream a Little Dream of Me
The Mamas and the Papas
The Papas & the Mamas
ABC/Dunhill DS 50031

Effigy
Creedence Clearwater Revival
Willy and the Poor Boys
Fantasy 4515

Different Shades of Blue
Joe Bonamassa
Different Shades of Blue
Provogue PRD 7441 4

Something to Love
Jason Isbell & the 400 Unit
The Nashville Sound
Southeastern Records/Thirty Tigers SER 9988

Somebody to Love
Jefferson Airplane
Surrealistic Pillow
RCA 3766

White Rabbit
Jefferson Airplane
Surrealistic Pillow
RCA 3766

Ease Back
Grant Green
Carryin’ On
Blue Note BST 84327

You and the Night and the Music
Dave McKenna
Dancing in the Dark and Other Music of Arthur Schwartz
Concord Jazz CCD-4292

Hey, Bulldog
The Beatles
Yellow Submarine
Apple Records/Capitol 3824672

White Room
Cream
Wheels of Fire
Polydor 8275782