NPR Music

Singer-songwriter Iris DeMent was born the youngest child of a large Pentecostal family in rural Arkansas, and later moved to Southern California. DeMent grew up listening to traditional country and gospel music, which influenced her roots-folk sound, though she was 25 when she wrote her first song. It would take another five years for her to release her first album, Infamous Angel.

The string-laden indie-folk band Horse Feathers makes its second appearance on Mountain Stage, recorded live on the campus of the University of Alaska at Fairbanks. Centering on the soft vocals and guitar of Justin Ringle, Horse Feathers' "chamber folk" sound is crafted with the assistance of cellist Lauren Vidal, violinist Angie Kuzma, Dustin Dybvig on drums and piano, and Nathan Crockett on violin, mandolin and the musical saw.

For all the plot development in the series' infancy, last Sunday's episode of Treme was unusually saturated in live performances. The second half of the episode, especially, seemed like one concert after another. Here with me to recap the musical goings-on is WBGO's Josh Jackson.

I was beyond excited and just a little nervous as I made the 30-second walk from the booth to the live room for this session in the KEXP studios. Usually, these things happen with one artist, but tonight I'd corral a round-robin of five MCs, a couple of whom were behind some of my favorite hip-hop of all time. Between the MCs, the DJs, the hype men and the keyboardists (not to mention KEXP's photographers and videographers), there were a dozen people waiting at the end of the hall.