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Jenny Lewis has the clear voice and honest melodicism of a guitar-strumming angel. But she is so good to look at and so forthright about her sexuality that some of Rilo Kiley's serious-minded natural audience suspect she is a pop starlet on the make, like Rihanna or the pitiable Britney Spears.

Unsigned and living in a van, Hoop took the Los Angeles area by storm with only a demo recording. Several years later, she has a fully fleshed-out major-label album, one that draws on sundry sounds and shape-shifting voices.

His pop songcraft mixes the international rhythms and polyglot languages of his native Barcelona. For Dani Carbonell, the voice and songwriting talent behind the band Macaco, musical fusion comes naturally.

Even a ubiquitous figure like Chuck Berry has neglected gems gathering spiderwebs in remote corners of his catalog. Blues helps fill in a bit of his legend, showing how he transferred devices used by generations of blues guitarists into the then-new rebellion of rock.

Mark O'Connor's new Americana Symphony follows the spirit of America's historic westward expansion and the music it engendered. The fiddler says he's trying to identify something long overlooked in classical music — our native language.

The former American Idol contestant, whom Paula Abdul dubbed "one funky white boy," just made Fight for Love, his second album since the competition. Yamin dishes on his soul sound, his time in the TV spotlight and, of course, his mom.

Pianist Ben Folds has crafted a series of alt-rock hits over the past 15 years. For his pseudo-"greatest-hits" package, he's commissioned new arrangements of those songs from university a cappella groups across the country. Folds and host Jacki Lyden compare and contrast the various versions of his songs.

Piano Jazz showcases another bright young pianist, Jeremy Siskind. Having recently graduated from the Eastman School of Music, Siskind has already won several impressive competitions and attracted the attention of Piano Jazz's host. His skills have taken him to Japan and around the U.S.

Verdi drew inspiration from his own tragic life as a father for a number of his operas, including Simon Boccanegra, where a father-daughter relationship fuels one of his most complex and moving of his tragedies.

The daughter of French pop artist Serge Gainsbourg and actress Jane Birkin has found success as an actress, as well as a singer and songwriter. Her latest record, IRM, finds her enlisting Beck.