On January 8, 2022, in the aftermath of a Nashville blizzard, an extraordinary group of musicians gathered at the historic Ryman Auditorium for a sold-out performance celebrating Béla's album My Bluegrass Heart, which went on to win the GRAMMY for Best Bluegrass Album later that year. Now that live recording has been released, with 20 tracks of incredible virtuosity and innovative picking. Joining Bela are Edgar Meyer & Mark Schatz on bass, Jerry Douglas & Justin Moses on Dobro, Michael Cleveland & Stuart Duncan on fiddle, Billy Strings, Stuart Duncan & Molly Tuttle on guitar, Sam Bush & Sierra Hull on mandolin, and Bela’s mentor Tony Trischka with additional banjo greatness.

One of our favorite singer/songwriters to come out of the West Coast these past few years, Margo Cilker is back with her third full-length. This one was co-produced by her and Texan Bruce Robison in Lockhart, TX, with an all-Texas backing band that included pedal steel player Eric Heywood, guitarist Geoff Queen, and fiddler Beth Chrisman. Cilker is a Pacific Northwest-based Americana artist with deep California roots, but you might mistake her for an Austin resident on this one. Most of these songs cover rather tragic topics, but she delivers them more as a witness than a victim, with the hope of righting the wrongs she writes about. As Steve Horowitz of Pop Matters writes, “Ultimately, Little White Cross succeeds not because it dwells on sadness but because it finds meaning within it. Margo Cilker’s voice may not be conventionally commanding, but her gifts as an interpreter and storyteller give these songs weight.”

In his last couple of months before dying in November of 2025, Todd Snider spent time in his East Nashville studio (famously known as The Purple Building) and laid down these songs solo. He had enough new compositions to work on what would have been a double album. “This album is a glimpse into the creative outpouring from Todd in September and October of 2025,” says the late singer/songwriter’s producer/engineer and longtime friend Joe Bisirri. “His ‘sound of country music 10 years from now’ meant taking his favorite country music tropes, dismantling and reassembling them over stretched-out, swampy grooves with New Orleans-style horns. He was so sure of this sound, feel, and his studio band's pliability that he insisted on recording his vocal and guitar first, with no accompaniment or click track. Todd wanted the band to record after him, so they would HAVE to follow his lead wherever it went.”

Music was always a constant presence throughout Danielle Ponder’s life, including time spent performing with her family’s band at a young age. But she pursued a legal career focused on criminal justice reform, until her late 30s when she allowed herself to seriously imagine music as more than a side pursuit. In 2021, at age 39, she finally took the leap, leaving law behind to pursue her artistry full-time. The gamble paid off: she signed her first record deal in 2022, and her debut album Some of Us Are Brave introduced Ponder as one of soul music’s most compelling new voices. Now she’s on Dead Oceans Records for this 2nd album, with support from Phoebe Bridgers among others. Everything Has Changed dismantles the stories Ponder once told herself and finds peace in what remains—all themes that have shaped much of her journey.

One of Canada’s most revered songwriters has decided to showcase the musical roots that inspired him to pursue a career in music as a teenager and young man: gospel, blues, jazz, folk, and pop songs that helped shape his artistic voice. “What began back in the eighties as a vague notion grew over time into a strong desire to put together a collection of material, written by others, that I found sticking to the edges of my musical landscape,” Cockburn explains. “The accumulation of these songs started in the sixties, before I’d even begun to try to create my own.” It’s just the 81-year-old and his acoustic guitar here, as he’s been doing on tour the past couple of years. In fact, he’ll be performing at the Carolina Theatre in Charlotte on October 30th and the Bijou Theatre in Knoxville on November 2nd.

Giddens and her long-time musical collaborator and writing partner, Dirk Powell, co-produced this new album, recorded live and engineered and mixed at The Cypress House in Breaux Bridge, Louisiana. Blending several originals with versions of traditional folk or old-time songs, Giddens and her collaborators deliver a beacon of hope in our dark time. WNCW fans will appreciate the wonderful diversity of roots styles here, thanks to Powell’s Cajun and Delta blues fiddle and guitar work, Congolese guitarist Niwel Tsumbu, and Giddens’ banjo and vocal prowess.

Henry Jenkins, Hudson Whitlock, Callum Riley, and Darvid Thor have been playing music together since their playground days. Meeting as high school preteens, these four friends explored the teachings of the great small combo instrumental bands à la Booker T. & the M.G.'s and The Meters. With these lessons in one hand and their characteristic sense of goofy humor in the other, the ensuing 18+ years saw Karate Boogaloo develop the kind of shared musical language that can only be built through countless hours spent together existing as friends and musical allies. All in all, a great all-instrumental out of Melbourne, Australia.

Grand Rapids, Minnesota trio Wild Horses - comprised of married couple Jed LaPlant [vocals, guitar] and Ariana LaPlant [vocals, fiddle, keys], joined by longtime friend Landon Pahl [bass] - have released their second full-length album, out now via Outlaw Foundry/Atlantic Outpost. Recorded in Montana, Nashville, and Minnesota, The In Between showcases the group’s signature hybrid of folk, Americana, country, and rock. The trio has lately been opening for the likes of Sam Barber, Charley Crockett, and Trampled By Turtles.

Israel Nash, hailed as a "master of sonic textures" by Rolling Stone, releases his adaptation of The Byrds' iconic 1968 album Sweetheart of the Rodeo. Reinterpreting the landmark record through a modern lens, Nash transforms the country-rock classic into a genre-bending take on contemporary American roots music. Exploration runs throughout the project – classic melodies shift in new directions, familiar rhythms are rebuilt, tempos move differently. Even the track list is different.

He’s 80, and he’s just released his 50th studio album! And is performing on stage with the energy and passion of rockers half his age. As Sam Sodomsky of Pitchfork writes, “Second Song is an act of hypnosis. For all of Neil Young’s enduring and endlessly regenerative influence, that power is what nobody can touch. Imitate his moody, mewing Canadian whine; adopt his verité approach to studio recording; tune your acoustic guitar to drop-D and overdrive your electric through a vintage amp; rip a solo that’s just one note and dig into the fretboard as if a weaker player handed you their instrument to help wear in the neck. But who else can conjure this kind of grainy, autumnal dream state with such effortlessness and patience, using such spare tools? For the first time since 2012’s louder and gnarlier Psychedelic Pill, Young spends his 50th studio album luxuriating in this gift, casting a glow of bittersweet contentment that feels distinct in his catalog.”