Despite being among the most statistically successful X Factor winners, in many ways, Alexandra Burke’s career has never really got off the ground. Burke has spent the decade since her talent-show triumph creatively confused (she admitted disliking Hallelujah, the Leonard Cohen song she covered as her winner’s single, and the track with which she is most commonly associated, while her subsequent output has featured some unduly painful dance-pop) and mired in record label woe. This state of affairs has delayed her third album by five years. Now, however, a fresh deal means the singer is taking a break from her other job as a musical theatre leading lady (and a dancer – she got to last year’s Strictly Come Dancing final) and having another stab at pop stardom.

After revealing that his next album would focus on gospel, Snoop Dogg has announced more details about the project. It’s called Bible of Love and it’s out March 16 via Snoop’s new gospel record label, All the Time Entertainment. It features Faith Evans, B Slade, Rance Allen, Tye Tribbett, and more. Check out his new video for “Words Are Few” below. “I’m working on a gospel album,” Snoop said on Beats 1 last May (via XXL). “It’s always been on my heart. I just never got around to it because I always be doing gangsta business or doing this or doing that.”

Musically, Ventriloquism has the hallmarks of all of Ndegeocello's work, lush and investigative, subversive and sublime. As always, she pays tribute to her diverse influences and in these eleven covers, we hear them layered over one another. Ndegeocello filters "Tender Love" through a folky, Californian filter and brings Vaudevillian accents to "Sensitivity". She recreates Smooth Operator in five, and turns "Private Dancer" into a sultry waltz. The reimagining affords not just a new musical experience but also a comment on the narrow expectations of sounds and structures for black artists and black music.

The Economist is a global weekly magazine written for those who share an uncommon interest in being well and broadly informed. Each issue explores the close links between domestic and international issues, business, politics, finance, current affairs, science, technology and the arts.

ules, behind it is the 26-year-old singer and guitarist, who plays all over Germany from living rooms to festivals on various stages. Driven by soulful grooves, jazz-influenced in melodies and harmonies, a cooking band that casually breaks with habits - JULES always creates that very special intimate atmosphere in which it seems their stories are ringing for the first time. On 16.3. Jules debut album Greenbird finally appears on the label Qftf. Multifaceted and versatile, from solo solos in singer-songwriter style to voice and guitar, through rough quartet numbers to small orchestras: it always remains authentic.

Almost every day, Bill Frisell gets up in the morning, has some coffee, and writes music. At this point, there are piles and piles and piles of single pages of staff paper filled with his graceful script. “I don’t know where the melodies come from,” says Frisell. “I try not to judge anything and just let them be.”