NPR Music

Woody Herman was one of the premier bandleaders in jazz, saxophonist Joe Lovano says.

"He didn't have the same chops and virtuosic approach like Benny Goodman or Artie Shaw, but he told a deep story," says Lovano, who played with Herman early in his career. "He was a blues player from his heart, and really had a beautiful voice on alto saxophone."

Singer-songwriter Mieka Pauley makes her second appearance on Mountain Stage, recorded live on the campus of West Virginia University in Morgantown. Born in Boston and raised in Kentucky and Colorado, Pauley told the audience that New York is the closest thing to a home she has now — not because she lives there, but because that's where her storage unit is located. "I'd like to pretend it's an artistic lifestyle ... but I made a series of bad choices."

As a child in Bogotá, Edmar Castañeda and his sister took folk dance classes. Their mother made sure of that. Castañeda liked the dancing, but he really liked the live harp accompaniment. In Spanish, the harp is called the llanero. It's Colombian, not a classical harp.

Egypt's capital, Cairo, is now synonymous with protests and sometimes violence. Late at night, the once-bustling downtown streets are largely empty these days. People worry about getting mugged or caught up in a mob.

But the recent Downtown Contemporary Arts Festival is an attempt to revitalize the area with music, art and culture in the old and forgotten venues of downtown Cairo, like the Qasr El Nil Theater.