Emmylou Harris and Rodney Crowell celebrate the release of their new duo album, The Traveling Kind, out next Tuesday, by hosting a "takeover" of SiriusXM Outlaw Country—channel 60—during the week of its release, including their own daily one-hour show, an interview and performance on The Buddy & Jim Show with Buddy Miller and Jim Lauderdale, and an intimate performance with a live audience at the SiriusXM studios in New York City for a very special broadcast event hosted by Elvis Costello.

The Staves are featured on the latest episode of NPR's All Songs Considered, titled "Nine Creative Musicians You Should Know." The episode centers on songs that suggest "a means of making magic out of circumstance," starting with The Staves' "No Me, No You, No More," off their new Justin Vernon-produced album, If I Was. It's "a rich, compelling folk song heavy with longing but buoyed by the trio's sweet, high harmonies," says the show. "The song is a testament to letting go of expectation in the midst of creation, to finding the way forward on a road no one expected to travel." The Staves perform at Rough Trade in Brooklyn next Monday, May 11, and at Vernon's Eaux Claires festival in July.

Punch Brothers stopped by NPR to give a Tiny Desk Concert. The concert opens with a special surprise for Thile, who happened to be celebrating a birthday that day, followed by a performance of four songs from their new album, The Phosphorescent Blues. Thile, "along with this versatile and talented group, rocked our world," says host Bob Boilen. "Punch Brothers mixes bluegrass, pop and classical music. It's a tough combination to imagine, and an even harder one to make work, but this band ... makes the unimaginable contagious and fun. They push boundaries and make music like no one else." Watch the Tiny Desk Concert here.

Composer Nico Muhly was the guest on NPR's On Point with Tom Ashbrook. His in-depth conversation with Ashbrook touches on a number of aspects of his work, not least his first large-scale opera, Two Boys. Nonesuch released the recording of Two Boys—recorded live during the Met's 2013 production with conductor David Robertson and director Bartlett Sher—in September. You can listen to the On Point interview here.

Tigran Hamasyan was featured on NPR's All Things Considered Sunday. He spoke with host Arun Rath about his new album, Mockroot, and its diverse musical influences. "Musicians arrive at their signature sounds through all sorts of influences, but [Hamasyan] may have the most unusual collection yet," says Rath, noting sources from the folk music of Hamasyan's native Armenia to metal to Indian classical music. "So when you listen to the music of Tigran Hamasyan, know that there's a lot going on there." You can listen to the conversation here.

Rhiannon Giddens recently stopped by Q104.3 in New York City for an appearance on Out of the Box. She spoke with host Jonathan “JC” Clarke about her recently release solo debut album, Tomorrow Is My Turn, and about working with producer T Bone Burnett on that and the Lost Basement Tapes project. She also performs the song “Angel City,” which closes out Tomorrow Is My Turn. Watch the interview and performance here.

Punch Brothers were the musical guests on Conan last night on TBS, performing "Magnet" from their new album, The Phosphorescent Blues. They were also the musical guest on a special episode of A Prairie Home Companion on Saturday, guest-hosted by none other than Chris Thile. Watch performances from both shows here. And tune in to NPR's World Cafe today to hear the band perform. 

Steve Reich is the subject of a feature-length special on BBC Radio 6 Music's The Tom Robinson Show, for which the composer spoke about his career and his latest work, Radio Rewrite. "His work with repetitive patterns and rhythms has been hugely influential across mainstream as well as experimental music," says the show. NPR Music looks back on the 50th anniversary of one groundbreaking piece: "It's Gonna Rain is just one example of Reich's broad musical lexicon that over five decades has influenced countless musicians in classical, electronic and even popular music."

Ethan Hawke and Patricia Arquette, stars of the Richard Linklater film Boyhood, were the guests on NPR's Fresh Air, talking with host Terry Gross about their roles in the groundbreaking film. "We were being offered a job no two actors had been offered before in the history of acting," says Hawke, "to get to create a character and use time as our clay, to shape somebody the way life shapes us." Hear the interview here.

Rhiannon Giddens's take on "Black Is the Color," from her forthcoming solo debut album, Tomorrow Is My Turn, is featured on NPR Music's Songs We Love. On the new album, "Giddens takes songs strongly linked to iconic female performers ... and somehow comes out owning them," says World Cafe host David Dye. On "Black Is the Color," often linked to Nina Simone, "Giddens celebrates and soars. She's confident in her instincts and her abundant talent, and she should be."

Filmmaker Paul Thomas Anderson is on the latest episode of WTF with Marc Maron. He talks with Maron about his life and all of his films, including his latest, Inherent Vice, which expands to additional US theaters this weekend. Nonesuch Records released Jonny Greenwood’s soundtrack to Inherent Vice in December and has released their previous collaborations, There Will Be Blood and The Master, as well as Jon Brion's soundtrack for Anderson’s Punch-Drunk Love. Tune in to WTF on Thursday for Maron's interview with Boyhood director Richard Linklater.

Robert Plant is the guest on the latest episode of WBEZ's Sound Opinions, discussing his new album, lullaby and... The Ceaseless Roar, which MOJO has just named one of the Best Albums of 2014. You can listen to the episode and watch the full interview here. Plant also spoke with The Quietus about the new album, which the site calls "his most fully realized solo album to date" and "a superb melting pot of influences ... Plant is forging ever forward while still retaining the exploratory vision that made his former alma mater such a unique proposition."