Ry Cooder's new album, I, Flathead, releases today and follows Chavez Ravine (2005) and My Name Is Buddy (2007) as the third and final album in Cooder's California trilogy. Two versions of the new record are available: the standard CD as well as a deluxe package with both the CD and the accompanying 95-page novella that Ry wrote in conjunction with the album songs, told from the perspective of the fictitious musician Kash Buk and featuring an oddball cast of characters and car obsessives from California's drag-racing salt flats in the 1960s.

Harps and Angels, Randy Newman's first album of new music in nearly a decade, is due out on Nonesuch August 5, and already, CBS Sunday Morning's Bill Flanagan is calling it one of the summer's best.

Congratulations to Emmylou Harris, who, the same week she entered the Top 40 on the UK pop charts, with her latest release, All I Intended to Be, debuted at No. 22 on the US pop charts, a career high. The new album simultaneously reached No. 4 on this week's country charts.

Tune in to npr.org tonight at 7:30 PM ET to hear Orchestra Boabab, live in concert. After nearly 40 years of making music, Orchestra Baobab, says NPR, "remains one of the world's foremost purveyors of Afro-Cuban pop.

Tune in to tonight's episode of ESPN's Baseball Tonight at 7 PM ET to catch the Punch Brothers' take on the classic baseball tune "Take Me Out to the Ballgame." ESPN celebrates the 100th anniversary of the iconic song by with a "battle of the bands."

Orchestra Baobab are currently touring the States with songs from their latest release, Made in Dakar, stopping at the Bonnaroo Festival in Tennessee this past weekend to perform a set that PopMatters calls "the gem of the festival." Tonight they're in Western Massachusetts to play Northampton's Pearl Street Nightclub and head further east at the end of the week for a set at the Somerville Theater, outside Boston, on Saturday. The Boston Globe's Andrew Gilbert says the band is "sounding more soulful than ever" on the new album.

The 2008 JVC Jazz Festival New York got under way earlier this week and continues through June 28 at venues throughout the City, including Carnegie Hall, where the Brad Mehldau Trio will play this Sunday in Zankel Hall in a program titled "A Taste of Genius," and the Greenwich Village club Le Poisson Rouge, where Bill Frisell's new trio will make its New York debut this Thursday.

Works by John Adams, Steve Reich, Philip Glass, Frederic Rzewski, Bill Frisell, John Zorn, John Cage meet the music of Mozart, Mendelssohn, and Beethoven at the Detroit Symphony Orchestra's second annual 8 Days in June music festival, which kicks off tonight. It's a multidisciplinary affair aiming to examine the relationship between music and the explosive changes of the 20th and 21st centuries and harness the "The Power of Change."

Tune in to the Late Show with David Letterman tonight to watch Emmylou Harris perform the song "Shores of White Sand" off her latest Nonesuch release, All I Intended to Be. The show begins at 11:35 PM ET on CBS stations across the country. Earlier in the day, Emmylou will perform live at New York's flagship Barnes & Noble store, in Union Square, beginning at 7 PM. The event, part of the store's One on One series, will be hosted by Katherine Lanpher, who will lead a discussion with the singer/songwriter as well.

k.d. lang received an honorary Doctorate of Laws degree from the University of Alberta in her native Canadian home province. In her acceptance speech during the university's commencement ceremonies in Edmonton, k.d. exhorted the university's graduates to dedicate their lives to helping others.

"Mr. DJ, can you play another song?" With those five words, David Byrne accepted his Lifetime Achievement Award from label mate and friend Laurie Anderson at the 12th annual Webby Awards ceremony Tuesday night in New York City. The Webbys, honoring the best of the internet, limit speeches for all recipients to just five words, making for some fittingly creative efforts on the part of award winners.