Feshareki/BBC Singers/Goddard review

Shiva Feshareki’s Divine Feminine fails to find its focus despite soprano Emma Tring’s incandescent, fearless performance of Celtic deity Brigid

Add to playlist: the maximalist melancholy of Hannah Lew and the week’s best tracks

The Californian creative navigates seamlessly from bass-driven disco to sparse electronic beats on her expansive debut album

Mitski review

The Shed, New York City: During a six-night residency, the singer creates an immersive world filled with wry humor and big emotions.

Harry Styles on Liam Payne's death: 'It's so difficult to lose a friend who is so like you in so many ways'

The musician reflected on the death of his former One Direction bandmate in an interview with Zane Lowe to promote his new album

Squeeze: Trixies review

In interviews to promote their 16th album, Chris Difford and Glenn Tilbrook have been upfront about the reason for its existence. After the world shrugged at The Knowledge in 2017, someone told Tilbrook: ‘Nobody is interested in a Squeeze record. What matters is Squeeze’s story.’ That stayed with me,” he says.

Lise Davidsen and James Baillieu: Live at the Met album review

(Decca)Davidsen/BaillieuRecorded in New York in 2023, the soprano sings Strauss, Wagner, Grieg and more to thrilling effect, her sincerity and passion matched perfectly on piano

Harry Styles: Kiss All the Time. Disco, Occasionally review

The music on Styles’s new album is muted, subtle and pleasant – but from the title downwards, he has a real problem with words

Corinne Bailey Rae: ‘If you weren’t tits-out-for-the-lads, they called you middle of the road’

Her first album was a huge hit – then she faced the sudden tragedy of her husband’s early death. She describes the rupture of grief, her return to music and the harsh reality of fame as a woman in the 00s

From David Bowie to Fleetwood Mac and Eric Clapton, Mike Vernon’s ear was invaluable to British pop and blues

The musician, producer and label head, who has died aged 81, turned his boyhood passion for blues into a hugely impactful career

‘Do what you really want to do while you’re still alive’: Masayoshi Takanaka, the Japanese guitar hero surfing a second wave in his 70s

Playing a surfboard-shaped axe, Takanaka was a stadium-level artist at home but little known in the west – until YouTube brought him a huge new audience

My guitar was mangled

I’m grateful to Taylor Swift, and others who have covered it, for introducing the song to a new generation. Three billion streams on Spotify is astonishing!

Bruno Mars: The Romantic review

(Atlantic)Harking back to Oye Como Va, Move On Up and other 20th-century classics, Mars’s homages are beautifully performed but bereft of new ideas