Before holiday music takes over the airwaves around us, here are some new releases from folk-jazz singer Norah Jones, roots-rocker Tom Petty and the eagerly awaited debut album from "American Idol" runner-up Adam Lambert. If you want information on your commute, we have a couple of audio books Malcolm Gladwell narrating his engaging essays on interesting social phenomena and Seth Godin reading a new version of his bestseller "Purple Cow," about changes in marketing. For classical music fans, Cecilia Bartoli is back, here with a recording of beautiful rarities from the Baroque era.

The Fall

Norah Jones s followed her "Come Away With Me," one of the biggest albums of the last decade, with two albums that continued to feature her laid-back soul-country-jazz vibe.

On her fourth album, she gives her songs a slightly harder edge, working with musicians who ve supported R.E.M, Elvis Costello, Beck and Tom Waits, among others, although the overall sound is distinctively Norah Jones. She is silky-voiced and intimate, even on up-tempo numbers like the lead-off track, Cashing Pirates and the moderate rocker It s Gonna Be.

Certain tunes have less of a Starbucks-contemporary jazz feel than those on Jones s breakthrough album, but the songbird s fans will recognize her breathy intimacy on such numbers as December and I Wouldn t Need You.
The Fall isn t a stark departure from Norah Jones s signature sound, but a progression from her sleepy romantic crooning into mid-tempo roots-rock that remains accessible and likely to be the soundtrack at many a coffee house around the world.

Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers

The Live Anthology

Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers are one of the most enduring American rock ensembles, whose distinctive sound guided by Petty s reedy but powerful voice hasn t dated in three decades.

Indeed, Petty has influenced generations of roots-rockers and his influence can even be heard in Pearl Jam, Wilco and contemporary country music.

This four-CD set is a collection of live tracks and videos recorded at concerts over 27 years, from venues as diverse as the Fillmore in San Francisco to London s Wembley Stadium. It includes iconic hits such as Refugee, Free Fallin and Here Comes My Girl as well as selected covers, like Goldfinger.

Malcolm Gladwell

What the Dog Saw: And Other Adventures

The author of the influential bestsellers "The Tipping Point," "Outliers" and "Blink" reads his new collection of essays here. The essay length is ideal for those who want short takes from Gladwell on his interesting look at aspects of everyday life as it relate to conventional wisdom and society.

Essays here include Gladwell s discussions of the varieties of mustard (vs. ketchup), a portrait of inventor Ron Popeil (Ronco s Chop-O-Matic, among others), personality tests, Ivy League admissions policies and more.

He s interested in the connections among seemingly disparate yet related areas. In one instance, for example, Gladwell examines the problems with perception, such as when he spent an spent an afternoon with a radiologist looking at mammograms and the radiologist imagined that the problems he had in accurately reading breast X-rays might have been similar to those the CIA had in looking at satellite photos those that purportedly showed weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

Gladwell reads these essays, which appeared in The New Yorker, in a husky, conversational voice capturing his own prose style without fuss.

Purple Cow: Transform Your Business By Being Remarkable

The popular blogger and business writer ("Tribes," "Permission Marketing" and many others) narrates a new edition of his bestselling book about what makes a company and its products distinctive and how to market to consumers. The dynamic of marketing is changing, Godin says in his unaffected, companionable voice. Old marketing strategies, traditional approaches are obsolete.

He explores why the old marketing methods, the magic formula of TV and radio and advertising, don t work in this age of word-of-mouth and digital media. For Godin, marketing isn t something you simply do the product itself has to be innovative as well as high quality. A simple enough message, but as many consumers know now, especially in this age of faulty newfangled financial products, it s one that can have pitfalls.

Adam Lambert

For Your Entertainment

The new CD from the runner-up in last season s "American Idol" is, like releases from a few other of non-winning contenders in the past (Clay Aiken, Jennifer Hudson), more highly anticipated than that of the winner.

Where American Idol champ Kris Allen s Live Like Were Dying has debuted to moderate interest, Adam Lambert s For Your Entertainment is the one hogging the spotlight. Lambert also stole the spotlight during the competition for his powerful, keening tenor voice, and his emotive interpretations of songs such as Mad World.

The singer was the rare American Idol contestant who embraced outsized theatricality (in American Idol terms, mascara makes a big statement), and he s crafting a family friendly glam-rock image. Indeed, the kick-off title-track single, For Your Entertainment, a rock shuffle, has a late-70s, early-80s feel that sounds like a mix of Kiss, Elton John and even a little bit of Squeeze.

Cecilia Bartoli

Sacrificium

The Italian mezzo-soprano is one of the most popular classical singers in the world, and even in this country, where she rarely tours, her records are bestsellers.

On her new release, Sacrificium, Bartoli explores the legacy of music written for the castrato, those male singers whose manhood was sacrificed in service to their vocal prowess. (They were able to sing high notes with great power and composers including Handel and Vivaldi wrote music of elaborate virtuosity for them.)

While the practice was beginning to die out in the 17th and 18th centuries, much great castrato music remained and Bartoli has uncovered some choice examples from the Baroque era. She is not only a singer of rare feeling, but also a musicologist who plumbs historic archives to in search of forgotten works.

These arias, from long-forgotten operas by little-known composers such as Antonio Caldara and Francesco Araia, are beautiful, and Bartoli brings passion and ardor to them. An additional disc includes some more familiar tunes, such as Handel s haunting Ombra mai fu, from Serse, which has been recorded by many contemporary classical singers.