Music

There are stories both famous and infamous of children pushed into performing careers by their parents (Britney Spears, Michael Jackson, Judy Garland ... the list goes on and on). But Vanessa Perez has become a fine young pianist despite her mother's best efforts to keep her away from the performing arts.

The reliable backup singer who seizes the spotlight is the stuff of entertainment-industry fairy tales, but Kelly Hogan hasn't actually had to labor in obscurity.

Pulling off horns in a rock song is always a challenge. Even two of the most notable successes, Chicago and Bruce Springsteen, have crossed the line into cheese at times. (Chicago spent the '80s nose-deep in it.)

Blunderbuss, Jack White's first solo album, is not just about him. It's about characters, he says.

"The 'hes' and 'shes' and 'Is' are sort of all arbitrary," White tellsGuy Raz, host of weekends on All Things Considered. "Some of them fall in the blues context of just 'man versus the world' or 'man versus woman,' or something like that, but they don't really have anything to do with male or female."

When tenor Noah Stewart was growing up in Harlem, N.Y., his friends called him "opera boy." They were onto something.

Earlier this year, he became the first black singer to hit No. 1 on the classical music charts in the U.K.

But Stewart's musical tastes aren't confined to Puccini, Bizet and Strauss, and his new, self-titled album gives him a chance to put his mark on everything from American spirituals to Top 40 hits.

Stewart says he doesn't mind being called an opera singer, but that he would rather just be called a singer.

Emeli Sande is already a star across the pond. Her debut album topped the charts in the UK this year. Her songwriting prowess has won wide acclaim and with her BRIT Critics' Choice Award, she joins the company of artists including Adele and Florence and the Machine.

Now it's time for another coming-out party of sorts. Sande is bringing her unique mix of pop ballads, soulful belting and dance arrangements to North America for a new tour. Her album, Our Version of Events, is out in the U.S. this week.

The Beach Boys are in harmony again. The group is recording and performing together, after years of disputes and estrangement.

Brian Wilson and Mike Love tell Guy Raz, host of weekends on All Things Considered, that they're not surprised at the reunion.

"We've had 50 years' practice," Wilson says, "not just in music but in being guys."

Love says once they got back in the studio and started writing again, it felt like they had never left.

"It was nuts," Wilson says. "It was a nutbuster."

In summer music festivals, as with TMZ news scoops and the vintage car market, exclusivity is the name of the game. The thinking goes like this: Festival attendees are looking for a good time and a good deal.

Emeli Sandé's jazzy vocal delivery finds middle ground between classic soul and modern-day R&B, with appeal to fans of indie pop and Top 40 alike. Her debut album, Our Version of Events, comes out next week, and it finds the best-selling BRIT Award winner testing the waters in the U.S., where she'll shoot for the kind of across-the-board success currently enjoyed by Adele.