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Record executive Simon Cowell is a judge on the talent show American Idol, which begins a new season this month. The hour-long show is a spin-off of one Cowell helped create in Britain, Pop Idol.

Madeleine Brand talks with Slate architecture critic Witold Rybczynski about how Mississippi's rebuilding plans in the wake of Hurricane Katrina differ from Louisiana's. Both states suffered widespread damage from storm surges and flooding.

"Solidarity Forever," the unofficial anthem of the American labor movement, was written in 1915 by a little-known poet named Ralph Chaplin and set to the civil war tune "John Brown's Body." Since then, it has been sung in union halls, jails and on picket lines across the country.

The images of New Orleans struggling in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina have been painful and disturbing. Life-long New Orleans resident and award-winning photographer Louis Sahuc talks about what's lost -- and how his photos preserve a city's memory.

William Bastone, editor of TheSmokingGun.com, discusses an article he wrote that details discrepancies between stories in James Frey's best-selling memoir A Million Little Pieces and public records such as police reports and court records. Through his attorney, Frey has strongly denied the accusations.

Writer and designer Jennifer Sharpe collects musical oddities. This time, Sharpe shares some selections from an unusual genre she calls "kid funk," including 6-year-old Angela Simpson's 1970s rendition of Langston Hughes poetry.

Book critic Maureen Corrigan reviews A Necessary Spectacle: Billie Jean King, Bobby Riggs, and the Tennis Match that Leveled the Game. It's about the 1973 battle of the sexes match that inspired great bravado and even greater publicity.

Visionary designers and technology experts put their heads together at the recent annual SIGGRAPH convention to showcase cutting-edge fashions that are part fanciful, part practical, part science fiction.

On Raul Midon's debut CD, State of Mind, Stevie Wonder shows up to play the harmonica. Midon's voice and music remind many of Wonder. Midon tells Liane Hansen about his influences and aspirations.

Herman Leonard's images made a visual record of jazz artists stretching from Louis Armstrong to Miles Davis. He awaits a look at his ruined New Orleans studio to see what became of his work.