Connecting with fans is an amazing experience. But do musicians really need to maintain that connection 24/7 online?

From the politically charged songs of “The Animal Years” to the more playful narrative style of his new album, the singer has consciously avoided repeating the “same old act.”

Avoiding the dreaded “girl/world” rhyme, and other songwriting tips.

Guitar isn’t “stuck in a canon”: it lets each musician express a unique voice. Succeeding at it means insisting on that voice with absolute confidence.

Josh Ritter had an epiphany while studying organic chemistry in college: he was meant to be a musician, not a scientist.

A conversation with the singer, songwriter, and musician.

Matt Yglesias makes a good point. The Tea Party activists talk a lot about the government taking away their freedom, whether by taxing them, byforcing them to buy health insurance, […]

Empathy is a complicated emotion, even for mice. On seeing another in pain, a mouse will act as if it itself is also hurting—much more, though, if it knows the […]

What kinds of incentives are necessary to get people to lead more environmentally responsible lives?  Ernst Weizsäcker, co-chair of the U.N. International Panel for Sustainable Resource Management, says that we […]

The first project Brian Henson worked on with his father, Muppets creator Jim Henson, was a scene in “The Great Muppet Caper” where Kermit and Miss Piggy are riding bicycles […]

In order for Lyme disease to properly proliferate in an area, to the point that you have to check every square inch of your body for ticks when you get […]

Today I respond to Francis’ most recent post: an objection to the L.A. Times’ use of e-commerce links in its online edition to generate ad revenue. In this case, I […]

Canadians live not only longer, but healthier lives than their American counterparts, according to a study in the latest issue of the peer-reviewed journal Population Health Metrics. Canadians and Americans […]

What is the future role of the world’s great libraries, and librarians? Harvard Magazine considers what will become of one University’s vast collections in the age of digitization, and finds […]

"To achieve deep focus nowadays is also to have struck a blow against the dissipation of self; it is to have strengthened one’s essential position," writes Sven Birkerts.

Plenty of people on Wall Street knew that a crash was coming—and that they responded by grabbing all the profit they could, writes Christopher Hayes. He thinks they should face criminal sanctions.

"Arctic amplification" refers to the fact that the region is warming twice as quickly as the rest of the planet—and as ice warms, exposing more ocean water, the process naturally speeds up.

There is no single part of the human brain that gives it advanced language capabilities. Rather, humans rely on multiple parts of the brain to extract meaning from sentences.

Some believe we should move a system where health insurers pay a fixed, up-front cost for each particular health problem—and let the hospital and caregivers use the money as they see fit.

"The May 1 riots in Berlin's Kreuzberg district have become an annual ritual. … Now an American anti-capitalist activist has started giving tours of the neighborhood's hot spots to foreign visitors."