Bach's oratorio The St. Matthew Passion has been called the Mount Everest of Western classical music. For some three and a half hours, it tells the story of Jesus' last days, based on the Gospel of St. Matthew. A new DVD deals with this monumental work in an original way.
New Yorker reporter Dexter Filkins just returned from his latest reporting trip to Afghanistan. "The United States is leaving: mission not accomplished," he writes.
Brian Castner commanded two Explosive Ordnance Disposal units in Iraq, where his team disabled roadside IEDs and investigated the aftermath of roadside car bombings. He returned home a completely different man, which he details in his memoir, The Long Walk.
Oliver Stone's new film Savages is a violent thriller starring Taylor Kitsch and Aaron Johnson as pot growers caught up in a Mexican drug war. Critic David Edelstein says the movie is deeper and more complicated than Stone's famously bloody Natural Born Killers.
A Southern hip-hop artist, Big K.R.I.T. recently released his major-label debut, titled Live From the Underground. Rock critic Ken Tucker says the album takes the audience through K.R.I.T.'s own version of Southern history.
Bassist Linda Oh's story is so compelling, everyone who write about her mentions it: how she was born in Malaysia to Chinese parents, who emigrated to western Australia when she was three. Oh's second album is out. Jazz critic Kevin Whitehead says her music also covers a lot of ground.
AIDS is the primary killer of African-Americans ages 19 to 44, and the mortality rate is 10 times higher for black Americans than for whites. A new Frontline documentary explores why.
The dB's, led by singer-songwrter-guitarists Peter Holsapple and Chris Stamey, hasn't made an album with the original line-up in 30 years. Rock critic Ken Tucker says the band's new album, Falling Off the Sky, sweeps aside decades and nostalgia to achieve a vital sound for today.
Jack Bishop and Bridget Lancaster highlight some of their favorite grilling techniques and summer recipes -- everything from meat to vegetables to, yes, even desserts.
In Karen Thompson Walker's first book, climate change makes the Earth's rotation go more and more sluggish, but this melancholy page-turner is more than just a disaster plot.
The health care case wasn't the only important decision rendered by the court during its recent term. New York Times reporter Adam Liptak rounds up the session's most important cases -- including ones addressing immigration, campaign finance and Guantanamo detainees.
Beasts of the Southern Wild came out of nowhere to win the Camera d'Or at Cannes and the Grand Jury Prize at Sundance. The fable-like film, starring 6-year-old Quvenzhane Wallis, takes place after a storm ravages Louisiana. (Recommended)
Fresh Air's critic at large, John Powers, says Louis C.K.'s raunchy FX show is changing the way comedy is done — for the better. "More than any TV comedy ever, it's all about capturing moments of truth and freshness," he says.
The James Beard award-winning chef was the youngest ever to receive a three-star review from The New York Times. His memoir, Yes, Chef, explains what it takes to be a master chef — and describes his journey from Ethiopia to Sweden to some of America's finest restaurants.
Airline veteran and writer William McGee says airlines' aggressive cost-cutting hasn't just added fees and hassles. He says they're taking steps that compromise safety — and regulators are letting it happen.
Nora Ephron, the essayist, novelist, screenwriter and film director, died Tuesday night in Manhattan. She was 71, and suffered from leukemia. Fresh Air remembers the creator of Silkwood and When Harry Met Sally with excerpts from a 2006 interview from WHYY's Radio Times.
College is now four times more expensive than it was 3 decades ago, pushing student loan debt over $1 trillion. A key reason for this growth is the competition among schools for status and prestige, says Kevin Carey, education policy director at the New America Foundation.
Apple's new album, The Idler Wheel Is Wiser Than the Driver of the Screw and Whipping Cords Will Serve You More Than Ropes Will Ever Do, is her first in seven years. Rock critic Ken Tucker says the frequently stripped-down sound is a backdrop for her thoughts about the complications of love.
The star of 30 Rock has two films out this summer. He plays a club owner in the film adaptation of the Broadway musical Rock of Ages. And he travels to Italy with an ensemble cast for Woody Allen's To Rome with Love.
Earlier this month, there was a national uproar when a Michigan state legislator was disciplined for using a clinical sexual term during a debate. According to linguist Geoff Nunberg, it was just one of many such incidents that reflect a trend he calls the New Reticence.
