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Slate advertising critic Seth Stevenson grades the latest commercials from real estate company Century 21, which feature a nagging wife and an agent listening in to what should be a private conversation.

We hear Handel's Overture to "The Triumph of Time and Truth," played by the Orchestra La Scintillia of Zurich Opera. Then mezzo-soprano Cecilia Bartoli performs an aria from Baroque composer Antonio Caldara: "The Triumph of Chastity."

Farai Chideya talks with Mathapelo Ngaka and Barbara Jackson, South African artists who run the company Monkeybiz. Their venture sells traditional beadwork to raise money for AIDS awareness and prevention projects.

The most popular branch of the Smithsonian will be closing after Labor Day to undergo a planned two-year renovation. The American History Museum wants to update the building's infrastructure and create a better display for the Star Spangled Banner. A painstaking 8-year conservation project on the flag was completed Wednesday.

A new MTV series profiles everything from small-town music styles to big-city slang and fashion — local talent doing hip-hop their own way. Ocean Mac Adams, vice president of MTV News, and host Sway Calloway talk about how local styles can filter up into the mainstream.

Ekaterina Dashkova so dazzled Benjamin Franklin that he nominated her as the first female member of the American Philosophical Society. Now artifacts from Dashkova's life are on display in an exhibit at the society's Philadelphia headquarters.

The tune "Misirlou" is heard in klezmer music, '50s exotica acts, surf guitar and many other forms. Guitar legend Dick Dale and NYU professor Yale Strom help trace the history of a haunting melody.

Perhaps only Hans Zimmer could compose a sweepingly atmospheric score befitting the much anticipated Da Vinci Code movie. The Academy Award-winner has composed some of Hollywood's best-known films including Gladiator and The Thin Red Line.

The video-sharing Web site YouTube.com has changed the way some people see the Internet. But it's also changing how people hear vintage artists, from the late Wilson Pickett to the up-and-coming Arctic Monkeys.

Over the last decade, Chan Marshall, who's known as Cat Power, has made a name for herself in the indie-rock world. On her latest album, The Greatest, she traveled to Memphis, where she recorded with some of the city's legendary soul musicians. The mix makes for a slow but infectious record.