Music

Elizabeth Doyle was brought up around all kinds of music from an early age, thanks to a truly musical family in South Dakota. Three of her four grandparents were professional musicians, including one radio performer and singing cowboy. Her father had played saxophone and clarinet in the Navy during WWII, and her mother was an avid singer and pianist. Both parents were fans of big-band music, jazz, and the show tunes of the '30s, '40s, and '50s.

One year ago, when I began graduate study in ethnomusicology at UCLA, I found myself undergoing what has become a familiar ritual. As I played my trombone in a near-empty classroom accompanied by a play-a-long recording, it occurred to me that I was in the midst of my sixth college big band audition. A professor — in this special case, guitar legend Kenny Burrell — led the proceedings. When he engulfed my hand in his massive grip, I learned that I was in.

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Pablo Helguera is a New York-based artist working with sculpture, drawing, photography and performance. You can see more of his work at Artworld Salon and on his own site.

• Sandy has wreaked havoc for many musicians in the Northeast, along with everyone else up here. The New Amsterdam label for new music, located in Brooklyn's Red Hook neighborhood, says it took quite a hit: "Our space was flooded with almost four feet of polluted sea water. As a result, about 70% of our catalog of CDs has been destroyed — CDs we hold on behalf of our artists (we do not own them). Literally ALL of our financial records were destroyed, including our back-up hard-drive.

Singer-songwriter Jonathan Edwards makes his second appearance on Mountain Stage, recorded live on the campus of the North House Folk School in Grand Marais, Minn. Edwards opens with the song for which he's best known: his infectious Top 5 hit from 1972, "Sunshine." He's backed by the Mountain Stage band for all but the final song of his set, the rousing "This Island Earth," which he sings a cappella. When he finishes, host Larry Groce tells the audience, "If you think he's not a good singer, try singing that one yourself."

Mollie O'Brien and Rich Moore appear here on Mountain Stage, recorded live on the campus of the North House Folk School in Grand Marais, Minn. Host Larry Groce says that of the nearly 2,000 guests who have appeared on the show, O'Brien is "perhaps the best singer we've ever had." This marks her 13th appearance on Mountain Stage, and her second alongside her partner in both music and life, guitarist and singer Rich Moore.