Guardian Music — Super-producers Trevor Horn and Steve Lipson on the subtle art of coaxing an outstanding performance from a singerWhen technology companies say artists should view recorded music as a promotional tool and make their living by touring, they forget tha... more info

Guardian Music — (Babel)Her voice may be soft and light, but there is nothing limp or vague about Emilia Martensson's singing. In her gentle way, she is among the most incisive of today's crop of impressive young vocalists. She also has a dauntingly wide and adventur... more info

Guardian Music — (Motema)Rising singing star Gregory Porter's exciting recent live shows in London balanced plenty of fizzing, fast music and jazz acrobatics with the honeyed tones of Nat King Cole he learned to imitate at his mother's knee. Much of this largely se... more info

Guardian Music — Pizza Express Soho, LondonNorah Jones, Diana Krall, Esbjörn Svensson, Jamie Cullum and Amy Winehouse have been among the stars who played the basement jazz club of Dean Street's Pizza Express when they were just glimmers. Following them comes the ma... more info

Guardian Music — The 85% of Australian suburban non-smoking philistines whose taxes helped assist in the 1999 $4.9m purchase of his A Bigger Grand Canyon for the National Gallery in Canberra will be devastated to know that David Hockney thinks they don't cut the must... more info

WFMU's Beware of the Blog — Mixed in with a dozen other as yet unlistened-to tapes I grabbed from the basement a month or so ago, I found one five inch reel which certainly stood out. It contained a recording of a TV show, which I've... more info

Guardian Music — The company that brought us Cliff and the Beatles, the Sex Pistols and Susan Boyle is disappearing. We should salute its contribution to our cultureIn the 1930s, after a merger with Columbia UK, EMI became the biggest record company in the world. By ... more info

Guardian Music — The singer from Editors teams up with the former Razorlight drummer to record a Christmas album, Funny Looking AngelsEditors singer Tom Smith has announced a Christmas album. Teaming up with Andy Burrows, a former drummer for Razorlight, Smith will c... more info

Totally Fuzzy — Saxophonist David Murray got the idea to pay tribute to the singing legend, a childhood hero of his, while recording in Cuba. Plays Nat King Cole En Español comes out Oct. 11. Read more » more info

Guardian Music — Distinguished and subtle New Orleans arranger and musicianWhen the tape stopped rolling as the string section finished playing Wardell Quezergue's orchestration of Mona Lisa, the old Nat King Cole song, for the Neville Brothers' album Fiyo On the Bay... more info