Bryan Ferry Wants To Be Your Valentine, DJ

Enlarge image i

Bryan Ferry.

Adam Whitehead/Courtesy of the artist

Bryan Ferry.

Adam Whitehead/Courtesy of the artist

This week, host Bob Boilen sits down with Roxy Music frontman Bryan Ferry to chat about the universal allure and importance of love songs. Ferry has had a long and transformative career, beginning with his years in the rock group Roxy Music, to a solo career that's spanned forty years and fourteen albums.

Though Ferry has long had a well-earned reputation for being a romantic crooner, he tells Bob "it's always easier for me to write the sad songs and sing the sad songs. The moments I feel more creative are when I'm feeling introspective and maybe a bit sad. It's rather a lonely occupation, writing songs."

Ferry recently released his innovative and completely surprising new album, The Jazz Age, which re-imagines classic Roxy Music tracks, as well as songs from Ferry's solo career, as 1920s-era instrumental jazz songs. On this edition of All Songs Considered, we'll hear a few of those songs, along with some of Ferry's personal (and sometimes heartbreaking) favorites, from artists such as Otis Redding, Aaron Neville, The Shirelles and Al Green.