Betto Arcos

The California theater company was born on the picket lines of the United Farm Workers Movement; its mission is to dramatize the struggles of everyday people and bring the stories to a wider audience.

The Uruguayan singer-songwriter Jorge Drexler, a former doctor, is known as a literate and introspective musician. But then he wondered how his brainy musings would translate to music for the body.

For Spanish singer Silvia Perez Cruz, stories are everything.

"Style is not what matters to me, but the result," she says through a translator. "The song has to have a story that I believe in and I can make my own. I think I have that influence from my mother. ...

It's a Saturday night at the Mangueira Samba School in Rio de Janeiro, where students are getting ready for Carnival. Millions of people will be dancing to the rhythms of Brazil's most popular music: samba.

Osvaldo Martins, one of the school's organizers, has put together a competition for the best ...

Portuguese-born António Zambujo sings fado, the style of music often called Portugal's blues. For decades, the genre's mournful songs have been associated with female singers — from the late Amália Rodrigues, whose role in popularizing the genre worldwide earned her the nickname "Queen of Fado," to current superstar Mariza. But ...

Alfredo Viana was one of the superstars of the Brazilian musical style known as choro. The flautist and saxophonist, better known by the nickname Pixinguinha, pushed the boundaries of choro by incorporating jazz and ragtime into his compositions.

Hamilton de Hollanda explores that connection on the new album Mundo de ...

Spanish singer Buika is at a new stage in her career. She just published her second book of poetry and she's currently producing her first film, based on a tale from that book. She also has a new album, La Noche Más Larga — "The Longest Night" -- ...

In a scene from the film Violeta Went to Heaven, the Chilean singer Violeta Parra (played by Francisca Gavilán) walks through the countryside with her son Angel in search of a woman whose songs she wants to learn and record. Her son asks her, "What if we can't find this ...

Ibrahim Maalouf plays a four-valve trumpet — most just have three. The extra valve, attached to the button a trumpeter pushes down, allows the Lebanese musician to play quarter-tones — the notes between notes that characterize Arabic "makams."

"The makams are scales and modes with quarter-tones and three quarter-tones intervals," ...

Poetry and other art forms have been integral to the "Peace with Justice and Dignity" movement. Poet Javier Sicilia, whose son was murdered by members of a drug cartel, says the poe...