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The New York Subway system is designed to move millions of people quickly and efficiently. But on any given Friday afternoon, trombonist Alex Lo Dico and his jazz band can bring commuters to a complete halt. The subways have been Lo Dico's stage for two decades now, and his philosophy is "swing 'til you drop." NPR's Robert Smith has the first in a summer series of street musician profiles.

Broadcast engineer and music fan Jeremy Ruck is one of the million Americans who've died from COVID-19. His sister Holly Ruck talks about him for our series, "Songs of Remembrance."

Amir ElSaffar put his New York City jazz club career on hold four years ago. ElSaffar, an Iraqi-American, put down the trumpet to learn the centuries-old singing style known as maqam. Having trained in the form, he has now released his own CD of the traditional music.

Music critic Milo Miles reviews two new collections of tunes from the late Latin pioneers Tito Rodriguez and Tito Puente. The two were rivals on the bandstand of the Palladium, the epicenter of the 1950s mambo craze.

Listening to Davis' propulsive funk, it's apparent that her image was just as important to her albums as a guitar or a keyboard or her voice. In 1975, she seemed to represent her era, but she probably pushed boundaries too far for mainstream music. Here, Meredith Ochs reviews a recent reissue of Davis' groundbreaking album Nasty Gal.

Randy Owen of the popular country band Alabama has just released his first solo CD, One on One. He's also the co-author of the memoir Born Country: How Faith, Family, and Music Brought Me Home. He talks about his new album, his home state and working with Dolly Parton.

Before he was famous for popularizing bossa nova with "The Girl from Ipanema" in the early 1960s, saxophonist Stan Getz recorded with small jazz groups all through the '50s. Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead says a new reissue shows Getz was one of the best at playing pretty.

Dave Chappelle's Block Party is a mix of Dave Chappelle's sketch comedy and musical interludes. It's a movie inspired, in part, by the 1973 documentary Wattstax. The movie is a fun mix of music and Chappelle at his best.

On IIII + IIII, Otura Mun and his bandmates weave hip-hop, jazz and dancehall influences into Afro-Cuban music. It's an electronic take on tradition that embraces the human touch.

Neither longtime Turkish leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan nor his main challenger Kemal Kilicdaroglu were able to win more than 50% of the vote. That means Turkey is heading for a runoff on May 28.