Orchestra Baobab were the featured guests on yesterday's episode of NPR's World Café. The show includes band member interviews and live performances from the group. You can listen online now at npr.org, which says the band, in its early days, created "a gorgeous, unique mix of harmonies, guitar, saxophone, bass, and drums which started a musical renaissance." Host David Dye says they were "the band in Dakar in the 1970s" and attests that "now, their latest album, Made in Dakar, shows that they are as inventive as ever."

Buena Vista Social Club at Carnegie Hall, released last week on high-grade vinyl and set for release as a double CD next Tuesday, is featured on the latest edition of NPR's All Songs Considered. The show's host, Bob Boilen, introduces "Silencio," the touching duet between Ibrahim Ferrer and Omara Portuondo, by saying of the entire set: "What I love about this music is how gently it all hangs together. It's both relaxed and precise at the same time."

Tonight at the 92nd Street Y in New York City: The Composer's Voice: John Adams. John Adams will talk with Juilliard dean Ara Guzelimian about his career; his opera Doctor Atomic, which receives its New York premiere at the Met next week; and his new memoir, Hallelujah Junction, just published by Farrar, Straus & Giroux. The program also features "musical illustrations" by mezzo-soprano Sasha Cooke, baritone Jordan Shanahan, and pianist Linda Hall.

The Glass Box, Nonesuch Records' 10-CD collection of works by Philip Glass, is due out at the end of the month and is available for pre-order now in the Nonesuch Store. Yesterday on BBC Radio 3, In Tune featured a discussion with Glass plus three excerpts from works in the box, including the seminal Einstein on the Beach. Lincoln Center has announced that its 50th anniversary season, 2009–10, will include a production of Einstein on the Beach by the New York City Opera in its newly renovated New York State Theater.

The kora—the 21-string West African harp—is the focus of tonight's episode of New Sounds on WNYC, New York public radio. Toumani Diabaté, whose solo kora record, The Mandé Variations, was released earlier this year, and who was recently described by the Boston Globe as "the uncontested master" of the instrument, will be among the featured artists on the show, as will Philip Glass, for his work with Gambian musician Foday Musa Suso.

Sam Phillips is on the road with songs from her latest release, Don't Do Anything, as well as past favorites. The BBC says Sam makes "smokey, sassy, sultry, smart-as-a-whip" music, and the new album is "an album to get deliriously lost within." All Songs Considered host Bob Boilen introduced last night's live NPR.org concert broadcast from the tour by calling her songs "miniature pop jewels." The Albany Times Union, reviewing the previous show, says Sam's vocals make "her probing, intelligent lyrics and her vibrant melodies all the more powerful." Previewing tonight's show, the Philadelphia Inquirer describes Sam's sound as "a sophisticated confluence of Kurt Weill, Tom Waits and late-period Marianne Faithfull, without any florid excesses."

Sam Phillips's tour continues with stops in the Northeast this weekend, including a special, free in-store performance at the Newbury Comics store in Harvard Square, Cambridge, celebrating the retailer's 30th anniversary. As the tour continues, Sam's Monday night show in Annapolis, Maryland, will be broadcast live from NPR, for All Songs Considered's online concert series, at npr.org. "Of all of Sam Phillips' roles as a musician," says NPR, "her latest incarnation is the most alluring."

Bill Frisell joins drummer Paul Motian and saxophonist Joe Lovano for a rare two-week stint at New York's Village Vanguard beginning tonight. New York Times jazz critic Nate Chinen describes them as "a blue-chip trio that’s shadowy, slippery and as open-ended as a koan," and says, "There’s no better place to see them than at the Village Vanguard." You can listen to Wednesday night's set as it unfolds live, on NPR station WBGO, Jazz88 FM, for the new series Live at the Village Vanguard.

After performing at the Virgin Mobile Fest in Baltimore this weekend, Wilco gears up for its performance at Tanglewood in Western Massachusetts tomorrow night. The Daily Gazette out of Schnectady, New York, more than an hour away, says "Wilco is worth the trip." Next to a sold-out show at Brooklyn's McCarren Park Pool. With all the travel, Wilco is also making an effort to reduce its environmental impact with a new ride-sharing initiative. Also, label mate David Byrne has his own ideas for reducing congestion, promoting bike use.

Nonesuch.com has launched the remaining segments of the video interview and performance of Randy discussing and playing songs from his latest release, Harps and Angels. On today's videos, Randy talks about writing the title track, how Jackson Brown's name makes its way onto "A Piece of the Pie," and making the record with producers Lenny Waronker and Mitchell Froom; he also performs the newly updated version of "Laugh and Be Happy" that appears on the new record. You can watch all of the videos now at nonesuch.com/media.

Randy Newman brings the music of his latest Nonesuch release, Harps and Angels, to the WNYC studios to perform live on The Leonard Lopate Show today. He discusses the pros and cons of political commentary on NPR's All Things Considered and on the latest videos at nonesuch.com/media. The New Statesman suggests that Randy's unique brand of storytelling has never been better realized than on Harps and Angels; Bloomberg says it "contains some of the most literate lyrics likely to be penned in 2008" and "some of Newman's most heartfelt ballads"; the San Diego Union-Tribune calls the album "a masterful collection of songs" with "exquisite lyrics set to the most sophisticated music he has yet written" outside a film score.

Today marks the long-awaited release of Randy Newman's Harps and Angels, and the reviews continue to come in, with the Associate Press saying that Randy "has produced a record to rival his best work, and it may be the best album of 2008." At noon ET, NPR will broadcast a recent concert Randy gave in which he and his band performed the new record in its entirety. Also from NPR, All Songs Considered host Bob Boilen invited Randy to guest DJ this week's show. "I really liked his older stuff," says Boilen of Randy. "I like him better when he's older."