To listen to Stevie Hawkins’ take on "A Song For You" is to have a conversation with a ghost in a dimly lit room after the show has ended. Hawkins, long the rhythmic engine for the song's originator Leon Russell, steps from behind the drum kit to the microphone, and the space between these two roles compresses decades into four and a half minutes....

It is clear that Gal Musette poured her entire essence into this song and sang from the very depths of her existence when she performed it. The American singer's follow-up single to the smash hit "Into the Blue" is now available digitally under the title "Pendulum," and it was released only recently off her 11-track album. The song examines a broad spectrum of human feelings and...