Carole King performs Tapestry, Hyde Park BST Festival

★★★ CAROLE KING PERFORMS TAPESTRY, HYDE PARK BST FESTIVAL Kitsch and intensity collide in a performance of the blues at the heart of the mainstream

Kitsch and intensity collide in a performance of the blues at the heart of the mainstream

If last night made anything clear it's that some things are still some way beyond the reach of hipster reappropriation. The audience in Hyde Park for Carole King was 99% white and middle-aged, with the very few younger people scattered about appearing to be teenagers there with their parents.

Reissue CDs Weekly: Pink Floyd

To mark the anniversary of his death, we take a look at Syd Barrett's historically important first recordings

Pictured above is the label of an exceptionally important Pink Floyd record issued last November. Only a thousand people bought a copy. That was the amount that hit shops. Pink Floyd 1965: Their First Recordings was a double seven-inch set with a historic importance inversely proportionate to its availability. It was the first ever outing for the earliest recordings by the band and, as such, the earliest compositions for them by its prime songwriter Syd Barrett.

DVD: Janis – Little Girl Blue

DVD: JANIS – LITTLE GIRL BLUE From Texas über-normal to San Francisco rock chick: at last the Janis Joplin story

From Texas über-normal to San Francisco rock chick: at last the Janis Joplin story

The Janis Joplin bio-doc has been a long time coming. The rock star’s family were notoriously cautious about exposure: who wouldn’t be, with a career so tragic and brief?

As it happens, their collaboration made possible the inclusion of the rock star’s poignant letters home, which the documentary uses to great effect throughout, revealing something of the singer’s inner life and vulnerability, in contrast with her careful self-presentation as a mixture of bad girl, sex bomb and Etta James impersonator.

Jazz FM Awards 2016

Legends and up-and-coming stars are recognised at the third Jazz FM Awards

A diverse mix of musicians from the worlds of jazz, blues, soul and beyond were honoured at the third Jazz FM Awards on Tuesday night, which took place in the 1920s art-deco setting of London’s Bloomsbury Ballroom.

CD: Damir Imamović's Sevdah Takht - Dvojka

Bosnian melancholy reaches deep into the soul

Black bile, the dark blood which feeds the melancholy mood, runs through musics that resonate with the heart’s longing. In Arabic sawdah is a word which draws together the ideas of black bile and, in Ottoman Turkey, the  pain-filled desire for the beloved. It lies at the root of the saudade of Portuguese fado but also the Bosnian musical genre known as sevdah or sevdalinka.

CD: Guadalupe Plata - Guadalupe Plata

A serving of raw and spicy blues from Andalusia

Guadalupe Plata are a Spanish three-piece whose tunes will be a sonic treat for those who like their blues raw but with an extra dash of flavour. On their self-titled second album, spikey blues, bebop and rockabilly sounds rub up against the Moorish and Romany roots of Andalusian traditional music to produce a very special gumbo that will appeal to lovers of RL Burnside, Tav Falco, Link Wray and gutsy Latino bands like The Plugz and Tito and Tarantula.

Funke and the Two Tone Baby, The Blues Kitchen

Kent nu-blues artist sings with five instruments and manic energy

The idea of being a one-man band usually has a double edge to it, the pluckiness of independence undercut by intimations of ramshackle loneliness. Dan Turnbull, performing as Kent nu-blues musician Funke and the Two Tone Baby, touring his second album Balance, expresses the dilemma well. Singing and beatboxing, while also playing harmonica, guitar, tambourine, stompbox and loop pedals, he brings a frenzied energy and multi-faceted sound to original, contemporary, blues ballads of love, awe and contemplation.

Rock 'n' Roll America, BBC Four

ROCK 'n' ROLL AMERICA, BBC FOUR The story of popular music's ground zero had Little Richard and a big impact

The story of popular music's ground zero had Little Richard and a big impact

One, two, three o’clock, four o’clock rock… For those who orchestrated the swing from blues to rock ‘n’ roll, it’s getting late. Like the Chelsea pensioners, their numbers are beginning to dwindle and, as time keeps on slipping, slipping, slipping into the future, their testimony must be recorded for posterity, lest it be lost for ever in the music mists (currently somewhere off the coast of Kintyre). Except – and it’s a fairly big "except" – this stuff’s already fairly well documented, no?

CD: Rickie Lee Jones - The Other Side of Desire

The singer-songwriter is no longer blocked, apart from in her sinuses

Since her gorgeous self-titled debut album in 1979, Rickie Lee Jones has been all round the houses. Her music has plotted a sinuous path through jazz, blues, pop, soul and straight up-and-down rock. Her fortunes have soared and dipped, and the lovers apostrophised in the songs have come and gone, starting with Tom Waits, subject of “We Belong Together”. Last year she sailed past her 60th birthday without having released any new material since her 50th. The Other Side of Desire comes out on a record label of the same name, and was crowd-funded.

Flamencura, Paco Peña Company, Sadler's Wells

FLAMENCURA, PACO PENA COMPANY, SADLER'S WELLS Top-quality showcase from some of the best in the business

Top-quality showcase from some of the best in the business

No, don't check your calendar – it's definitely not March. I associate flamenco at Sadler's Wells so strongly with their annual two-week festival in early spring that watching Paco Peña Company at the Wells last night felt a bit like a cheeky out-of-season treat, akin to buying foreign strawberries before the native ones have come in. Fortunately, this was no watery, bland, forced berry, though: Peña and friends are some of the best in the business, purveying reliably high-quality goods in smart, well-produced packaging.