New Sounds

07/16/2026

Jazz-funk brass band EMEFE didn’t plan on getting back together after their indefinite hiatus in 2016. Everyone involved with the project at the time, including founding member and drummer Miles Francis, went on to pursue other musical endeavors, until one of their 2015 album tracks, titled “Sun Spat,” began to gain some traction online years later.

“We never heard from anybody from Spotify or any of these companies. It truly felt like people listening,” says Francis, highlighting this rare experience at a time when artists fought for attention like never before. After millions of streams, fan covers of the song emerged and EMEFE couldn’t ignore the buzz anymore.

Shortly after their reunion, they recorded a new album, aptly titled Forward. Now, they’re back on the road as a 10-piece band, with Doug Berns on bass, Jake Pinto on keys, Jas Walton on tenor sax, Lynn Ligammari on baritone sax, Jackie Coleman on trumpet, Aani Kisslinger on trombone, Alden Harris-McCoy and Tony Jarvis on guitars, and Javier Ramos on congas and shekere. We managed to fit them all into our studio to bring you their special performance of afrobeat-infused EMEFE songs, old and new, for the latest edition of our

This is "Stutter".

Watch the full performance at youtube.com/NewSoundsMusic

This episode of Soundcheck is available at newsounds.org, the WNYC app, or wherever you get your podcasts.

EMEFE

07/02/2026

What happens when an electric guitar is used to interpret music from cultures that completely ignore the Western tonal system? Guitarist Marisa Anderson dove into the depths of late filmmaker Harry Smith’s record collection to find out. While Smith himself once did similar research to compile his influential Anthology of American Folk Music, Anderson was more interested in compositions and improvisations that emerged outside of her country. She felt particularly drawn to recordings from places the United States has been in conflict with for decades, which led her down the path of producing her own Anthology of UnAmerican Folk Music.

Transcribed in her “first language”, the electric guitar, and accompanied by soundscapes built with keyboards, the accordion, and other instruments, Anderson carefully arranged pieces from Afghanistan, Yemen, Vietnam, and more. As she bent the strings of her guitar to achieve some form of microtonality, she kept questioning the concept of being unamerican: “Who are the people we’ve been told in our lifetimes are “unamerican?” What have we lost or been denied access to in the fallout from that label?”

Anderson brings some of her interpretations to our studio for the latest edition of the

This is "Sarvi Simin".

Watch the full video at youtube.com/NewSoundsMusic and listen to the latest episode of Soundcheck at newsounds.org, the WNYC app, or wherever you get your podcasts.

06/27/2026

For Dallas-born folk singer-songwriter anjimile, who grew up in a conservative Christian family with immigrant parents from Malawi, life wasn’t always easy to figure out. Their journey as a young adult, trans man, while simultaneously battling addiction, resulted in the brutally honest 2020 album, Giver Taker, which the artist deemed to be full of prayers. A few years later came The King, his most defiant and intense record to date, which helped Anjimile deal with the complex emotions that stem from existing as a Black, trans person in the current political climate. And though that album felt like one filled with curses, the latest addition to their discography, titled You’re Free to Go, appears to be “an album of blooming.” As Anjimile puts it, “a lot of the themes are related to transformation and/or growing pains… a blooming spring is a beautiful thing but it’s also a disruption to the status quo.”

As his voice deepened and grew in confidence, Anjimile discovered “a newfound level of comfort”, both in singing and composing his music. And though he appeared on Soundcheck before, he returns with a new sonic palette and stories, encapsulating moments of acceptance and eagerness to let love in.

This is "Rust and Wire".

Watch the full performance at youtube.com/newsoundsmusic

And listen to Anjimile's interview at newsounds.org or wherever you get your podcasts, on the latest episode of Soundcheck.

06/15/2026

The London-based art rock band, , is getting ready to release their debut album after four years of trying to make sense of strange things in life through music. “I think that life is very surreal,” says the vocalist of the group, Clari Freeman-Taylor, as she explains why she enjoys “writing about things that may be a little bit unsettling”. Nothing about the order of life is rehearsed, so why should their music be? Their practice relies heavily on their songwriting and arranging rituals where they carefully piece each layer of sound together. But preparations for live performances are enforced with a spirit of spontaneity, which, as the viola and bass player Saya Barbaglia points out, is a big part of their sound.

The duo blurred the rigid lines of classical music together as they grew into their teenage years with rock music. They traded hours of sight-reading for jam sessions that led to endless scraps of ideas. Those ideas would eventually become fully fleshed-out songs with the addition of drummer David Addison to the band.

mary in the junkyard’s upcoming LP, Role Model Hermit, carries hints of Freeman-Taylor and Barbaglia’s classical music background, as dense string arrangements pop up every now and then. But in our studio, the trio reveals the core of each song they perform: raw, skeletal, dark, and light, all at the same time.

This is "New Muscles".

To watch the full performance, go to youtube.com/newsoundsmusic where you'll also find the live performances of their soon-to-be-released songs, "Myrtle" and "Blood".

mary in the junkyard is on today's episode of our , available at newsounds.org, the app, and all major podcast platforms.

06/11/2026

Bassoonist Joy Guidry is a versatile improviser, performance artist, and composer of experimental ambient electronic music, who has founded her own record label, Jaid Records. While she is classically-trained, she has also listened deeply to some of the spiritual jazz of Pharoah Sanders, Alice Coltrane, Shabaka, and Nala Sinephro, and collaborates widely, most recently at the Park Avenue Armory in New York with Jessie Cox, Tcheser Holmes, and Scott Li. Her latest album Five Prayers, is a collection of works for bassoon with electronics, in which the Houston-born musician and sound architect takes inspiration from the spirit of the Black church and atmospheric sounds of ambient music.

Joy Guidry performs in-studio for the latest episode of the , out today on all major podcast platforms.

This is "You've Done What You Can".

To watch the performance in full, go to youtube.com/newsoundsmusic

WNYC Studios

05/27/2026

Hear works that combine Renaissance polyphony and prog rock, art-rock, and/or thrashy noise rock by Brooklyn-based Simon Hanes; composer/guitarist Andrew McKenna Lee and the Brooklyn art rock ensemble The Knells; and composer, vocalist, and writer Kate Soper.

Hear works that combine Renaissance polyphony and prog rock, art-rock, and/or thrashy noise rock by Brooklyn-based Simon Hanes; Brooklyn ensemble The Knells; and composer Kate Soper.

04/14/2026

Marilina Bertoldi is a rising star in Argentina’s alt-rock scene, owning the stage wherever she performs – and this time was no different. This is “O No?” from studios, recorded for the

Head over to youtube.com/newsoundsmusic to watch the performance in full.

04/10/2026

Philip Glass and Brian Eno are two very different composers with distinct creative tendencies, yet somehow, their works fit Bruce Brubaker’s piano reinterpretations like a glove. Brubaker’s New Sounds Live performance at on February 12, 2026, proved once again that when it’s him playing the piano, it’s easy to find a common thread between their compositions as well as his own.

Recorded in front of a live audience, this exclusive recital pulls Brubaker’s artistry into focus, stripped from the electronic enhancements of the prepared piano he often records with. His playing is emotive and widely dynamic, forming each musical phrase with care.

Join us as we revisit this memorable night of music with Brubaker, filled with pensive piano arpeggios and chord progressions, as well as a lively chat between the artist and our host, John Schaefer, on today’s episode of our daily radio show, New Sounds. Available now at newsounds.org and the app.

04/09/2026

The Syrian-American rapper, poet, and peace activist Omar Offendum blends the sounds of hip hop and classical Arab music and literature into his stage works. He has spent much of the past few years on a New York-themed work called The Little Syria Show, named after a historical neighborhood in Lower Manhattan. In a celebration of Arab-American cultural heritage, Omar Offendum shares insights on diasporic memory and performs some of the songs from The Little Syria Show, in-studio. Listen at newsounds.org, the app, or wherever you get your podcasts.

03/30/2026

New Sounds memories continued, from this year’s

1. The Curious Listening in the Streaming Era panel, moderated by New Sounds host John Schaefer and author , with panelists , , and .yaz

2. Kaoru Watanabe’s () Bloodlines Interwoven (Concert II), unpacking new tales at The Greyhound

3. Electrical Field of Love ( & .muldrow) making psychedelic neo-soul music at Jackson Terminal

4. singing stirring melodies and bending her guitar strings to match Matthew Jamal’s (.applepie) fluid cello motions at First Presbyterian Chapel

5. constructing atmospheric compositions in realtime at First Presbyterian Sanctuary

6. , shrouded in fog and shoegaze guitars, at The Standard

7. .band wrapping up three nights of improvised grooves at The Greyhound

8. playing jangly indie rock at Barley’s

9. and .yaz duetting on guitar at