Dec 29, 2015

He has designed both elegant private houses (Alexander McQueen's) and grand public spaces (the Nobel Peace Prize Center in Oslo). While he was working on the Smithsonian's Museum of African American History and Culture, he was often asked: will it look African American? But what does that mean? Does Renzo Piano's...

Dec 22, 2015

Most musicians, even talented musicians, have no careers at all. Hers has lasted, depending how you count, 40 years? 50 years? Or, with my special math, 1,000 years, dating to the middle ages. At 15 she was singing commercial jingles; while still in high school she was a staff writer for Chappell Music. Her first hits,...

Dec 15, 2015

It is his core belief that food affects not only our personal but our political health, an idea he's expressed through cookbooks, cooking shows and an oped column in the NY Times. Plus, music from Stephanie and Reid Jenkins. 

Dec 9, 2015

He represents New York City's third congressional district, comprising much of both Nassau and Suffolk counties, as Long Islandian as you can get. He is the first member of Congress to be a guest on the show, so the stakes were pretty... actually, there was no pressure at all. He was amiable, I was attentive and...

Nov 22, 2015

If he is best known for klezmer music, he has only himself to blame: he plays it brilliantly, honoring its roots without making it a museum piece.  And he leaps across genres, sometimes in a single work. He once recorded an album that charted top ten for Jewish music, funk, and jazz, and for all I know, self-help...