In looking over my playlist for this week, it's once again apparent to me that getting a "theme" from a bunch of songs I've smushed together because I know they sound great together, is hard work. I have a rhythm, a system really, when I'm selecting songs to play for the World Music Show. And that system boils down to my emotional, gut feeling of the music. Sometimes I don't think too much but instead go with the feeling the music gives.

Listen: from my understanding, birthdays are celebrations of the passage of time; and are a time to look behind at things past and at the future of things yet to come. So it is with this pending birthday that I want to bestow onto you, my faithful listeners, some musical gifts of things past (in this case, some of my favorite nuggets from the past year or so). As the saying goes, it’s better to give than receive, right? Here are some of the highlights from this week’s show:

The title of this week’s World Music Show blog refers to the title track to the latest CD by Paul Simon. Part of the lyrics are: “Life is what you make it, so beautiful or so what.” I don’t know about you, but every now and then, I need a reminder like that. Like many, I get bogged down in the day to day activities of life. Sure it’s summer, but with two young kids and two jobs, I often get caught in that web of stopping to notice the cool and absurd things about life.