Editor's Choice - Music

Recent highlights from the music world - here is the Editor's Choice of live performance, recordings, interviews and special features.

Listen 16/03/2009 - Goran Bregovic (6mins 4 Secs)

One of the biggest names in Balkan music - Goran Bregovic popped into The Strand studio to tell us about his new album Alkohol.

Listen 04/03/2009 - Sir Willard White (8 mins 57 secs)

Opera singer Sir Willard White talks to Rajan Datar about performing the music of his hero - singer and activist Paul Robeson.

Listen 25/02/2009 - Oumou Sangare (7 mins 7 secs)

The most popular female singer in Mali - Oumou Sangare is back with her first album in six years. Here she talks to Mark Coles about making the album Seya, and the importance of Wassoulou music in her work.

Listen 24/02/2009 - Courtney Pine (6 mins 49 secs)

British Jazz superstar Courtney Pine talks to The Strand about his new album Transition in Tradition, a homage to the music of New Orleans Jazz originator Sydney Bechet.

Listen 15/01/2009 - Albums to look out for in 2009 (8 mins 34 secs)

Music journalist Sophie Harris picks the music acts to listen out for in 2009. Will the likes of White Lies, Florence And The Machine and Empire of The Sun live up to the hype?

Listen 12/01/2009 - Motown at 50

As the legendary record label reaches its 50th anniversary, Mark Coles talks to the songwriting trio Holland Dozier Holland who between them wrote 54 number 1 Motown singles and notched up 100 million TV and radio airplays around the world.

01/01/2009 Rokia Traore - Video

The award winning Malian singer-songwriter plays live in the studio.

Listen 24/11/2008 The Priests (6 mins 10 secs)

A trio of Irish catholic priests have signed a million pound record deal.

Listen 21/11/2008 Early classical music recordings (7 mins 50 secs)

Some of the earliest recordings ever made have been unearthed and will become available on CD.

Listen 22/10/2008 Rokia Traore (16 mins 04 secs)

Malian musician Rokia Traore performs tracks from her latest album.

Listen 14/10/2008 Hendrix's Fender Strat. (8 mins, 20 secs)

Hendrix's burned guitar

Incendiary rock - Legendary musician Jimi Hendrix was known for setting his guitars on fire. Mark Coles gets to fulfil one of his dreams by playing one of these guitars.

Listen 14/10/2008 John Adams. (13 mins, 10 secs)

The controversial American composer John Adams takes his music to one of the bastions of US high culture this week....as one of his best known works "Dr Atomic" - about the building of the atomic bomb - opens at New York's prestigious Metropolitan Opera.