AA: I'm Avi Arditti with Rosanne Skirble, and this week on Wordmaster: palindromes aplenty!

RS: A palindrome is something that reads the same backwards or forwards. Palindromes make us think of Janus, the Roman god with one face looking forward, another looking backward.

AA: And from Janus we get January. And from that we get the idea to re-run "The Ballad of Palindrome" each New Year.

RS: It features a skit that spoofs a cowboy show on television in the 1950s called "Paladin." Here now is the group Riders in the Sky joined by singer and songwriter Johnny Western.

Riders in the Sky

Riders in the Sky

(SOUND)

RS: That's Riders in the Sky, from their 1998 album, "A Great Big Western HOWDY!" on the Rounder Records label.

AA: And that's Wordmaster for this week. Our e-mail address is word@voanews.com. And our segments are all online at voanews.com/wordmaster. Wishing you a happy and healthy new year, with Rosanne Skirble, I'm Avi Arditti.