Brother Bill is back from Spain with a load of folk CD's from Galicia, including one from piper Anxo Lorenzo (pictured). And how about a Galician cover of "California Dreamin' "? Those and much more on this week's edition of The Folk Brothers.

Today we have a summer show. It’s an appreciation of pop music as created by my guest Bob Cowsill (on right in photo) and by his siblings—together, known as the Cowsills. They had top 10 songs in the 1960s, but there’s more to their story than their hits “Hair,” or “The Rain, The Park, and Other Things.” The Cowsills perform in Sacramento on July 11 at the Crest Theatre as part of the Happy Together tour, and they have a new record due out this fall.

And, dear listener, if the songs we talk about today aren’t ones you heard as a kid or young adult, well, then as you listen, I invite you to think about the songs that helped alert you to the fun and the feeling of music. Because that’s the larger story here: the power of music. And maybe the power of a family.

It's not too often that alt-folk musicians are profiled in high-impact publications like The Guardian and The New York Times, but singer-songwriter Joan Shelley was, last week. The Lousiville, Kentucky, native just released her latest album, The Spur, which is garnering international attention. Also on today's show, new music from Eddie Berman, Heidi Talbot, Sharon Shannon, Kevin Morby, Bella Hardy, Vieux Farka Toure, and much more.

Listening Lyrics is proud to present Didar Singh Khalsa. Joining Didar is Jeff Brooks, percussion. Didar has played guitars for 52 years, but started writing, singing and recording songs only six years ago, inspired by six consecutive trips to the guitar/songwriting camp taught by the amazing Richard Thompson. He claims the muse is relentless and not even very intermittent. Let’s test that theory.