Tiny Desk Concerts - Video

Following a frenetic and enjoyable set at the Newport Folk Festival, David Wax Museum brings its infectious blend of American and Mexican folk music to the NPR Music offices. Watch the band perform with a Mexican jarocha guitar and percussive donkey jawbone.

Gyptian, who'd already conquered radio from Kingston to French Guyana and London with his song "Hold You," won hearts at NPR Music's Washington, D.C., office within moments of walking in the door.

Washburn planned to study law at Beijing University, but her love of bluegrass landed her a record deal instead. Still, China remains in her heart: Her latest album, City of Refuge, mixes American bluegrass with Chinese folk music. Watch her play songs from the album at the NPR Music offices.

Maita's music combines crisp staccato guitar licks, a subtle Brazilian pulse and vocals as soft as a late-afternoon ocean breeze. Yet without the electronic touches of her studio recordings, Maita glides, floats and sprinkles notes onto just the right places in this engaging Tiny Desk Concert.

With a pink tinsel tree and an animatronic singing Santa hat, the extraordinary jazz drummer clearly embraces the campy side of Christmas. His band's look may be a bit hokey, but as it proves in this performance, their musicianship isn't.

The Heligoats' Chris Otepka is the star of NPR Music's 100th Tiny Desk Concert. In many ways, he's the perfect act to mark the milestone: His music is best heard in an intimate setting, where his words can unfurl clearly and he can hold a small room rapt -- which he does here, to say the least.

The 10 members of The Red River normally play with guitars and violins, French horns, keyboards and drums. But they rose to the challenge of squeezing behind the Tiny Desk and re-arranging their songs for an elegant, stripped-down performance.

Harps are something of a curiosity, even to the other members of the orchestra: They're huge and difficult to tune. So when Yolanda Kondonassis parked her giant and distinct Art Deco-inspired instrument behind the Tiny Desk, it had a powerful presence in the room.

Buke and Gass' homemade quality is what draws you in at first. Arone Dyer plays a modified baritone-ukulele run through effects that squeal with delight while bandmate Aron Sanchez runs his guitar-bass hybrid through two amps. Watch the duo play a joyfully pummeling set from the Tiny Desk.

Khaira Arby, the queen of desert rock, arrived like international royalty to perform selections from her new album, Timbuktu Tarab. Watch the Malian singer unveil her stunning vocal chops with her seven-piece band at the NPR Music offices.

The Icelandic singer Olof Arnalds usually warbles her folk-flavored tunes in her native Nordic tongue. But her new record, 'Innundir Skinni,' is her first to include songs sung in English. Watch Arnalds perform a lovely Tiny Desk Concert from the NPR Music offices.

Hear new songs by two down-to-earth people with their heads in the clouds: Sean Lennon and Charlotte Kemp Muhl. Together, as The Ghost of A Saber Tooth Tiger, they write dreamy musings on everything from dark matter to the pedestrian and mundane. Watch the duo perform songs from 'Acoustic Sessions' in the NPR offices.

The music and voice of singer-songwriter Sharon Van Etten are engineered to turn each listener into a weepy, vulnerable heap. In this lovely performance at the NPR Music offices, Van Etten plays a beguiling set of songs from her latest album, Epic.

Los Lobos has proven time and again that a universal shared experience will always trump culture and language. This short set from the NPR Music office features something new, something old and something to dance to.

At the NPR Music offices, Trixie Whitley and Daniel Lanois brought a variety of instrumental backing, including an electronic bed for the single "I Believe in You," only to ditch many of the accoutrements on the fly. The result is a gripping and revealing performance.