From rap to rock to singer-songwriter pop, 2019 was a bountiful year for all kinds of music. Lil Nas X's hit "Old Town Road" defined the year with its massive, genre-crossing popularity and sheer catchiness. But when it came to the best albums of 2019, female artists reigned.

Tina: The Tina Turner Musical tells the rags-to-riches — to rags again, then to riches again — saga of Tina Turner's life.

It starts in Nutbush, Tenn., where the young Anna Mae Bullock was born. Then it documents her rise to stardom with Ike Turner — who she eventually married and then left after years of abuse — and then her improbable (but somehow entirely fitting) second rise to fame as a solo performer, in her mid-40s no less.

Caroll Spinney, the actor and puppeteer who portrayed Big Bird and Oscar the Grouch on Sesame Street over five decades, died Sunday at age 85.

The Sesame Workshop said Spinney had died at home in Connecticut, and that he had long lived with dystonia, a disorder that causes involuntary muscle contractions.

It's list-making season or, as we like to say, time to shake out the calendar and look back at all the incredible new music we got in 2019. So we want to know: What were your favorite albums (or EPs) released this past year? Use the poll below to tell us. You can pick up to 5 releases. Don't rank your list and don't vote for the same release more than once. (Those votes won't be counted.) We'll share the results in an upcoming episode of All Songs Considered.

You know the intensity of the NBA. A million coaches in the stands and on the court, high-pressure nail-biters, Stephen A. Smith pontificating about sleep.

On the Navajo Nation, rez ball has all of that (well, we can’t confirm the commentary on sleep) and more.

Greta Thunberg did not sail across the Atlantic Ocean for two weeks to become a lead singer. But, just days after the 16-year-old proselytizer censured a room of world leaders many times her age for their shared "fairy tales of eternal economic growth," the internet made her one, anyway.

This past September, the 20th annual Americana Music Festival & Conference featured a broad range of showcases from diverse musicians across alt-country, roots-rock, bluegrass, R&B, blues, folk and the singer-songwriter genre.