“This week’s guest is a trailblazer, a musical activist, a multi-disciplinary, multi-genre artist who has truly carved her own path of both honoring and celebrating lineage and creating a new one for generations to come,” Carmel Holt says of the guest on the third-anniversary episode of her show Sheroes. “Now nearly two decades into her career, Rhiannon Giddens has become one of the most awe-inspiring and influential artists of our time.” Holt talks with Giddens—who was also the radio show’s first guest three years ago—about her Grammy-nominated new album, You’re the One, and more. You can hear their conversation here.

“In many ways, John Adams is the quintessential California composer,” Nadia Sirota writes in the introduction to Adams’ audio interview with the California Festival, a statewide initiative showcasing contemporary classical music, including live performances at venues across the state over the past three weeks. Adams, a resident of Northern California since moving there from New England in 1971, talks about his early days in the area and the inspiration behind some of his most influential early works, like Christian Zeal and Activity, Phrygian Gates, Shaker Loops, and Harmonielehre. You can hear what he has to say here.

Natalie Merchant was on Radio Popolare in Milan to discuss her new album, Keep Your Courage, and more and perform the title track to her 2001 album, Motherland, live in the studio. The session comes ahead of the close of Merchant's European tour and her first shows in Italy in over 20 years, in Milan and Chiara this weekend. You can hear the conversation and performance here. Merchant will return to Italy to host a new workshop at Fondazione Prada’s Accademia dei bambini in Milan on January 28.

“Rhiannon Giddens added to her impressive list of accomplishments earlier this year when the Grammy winner and MacArthur ‘Genius’ Grant recipient won the 2023 Pulitzer Prize in Music as co-composer of the opera Omar,” Kallao says of his guest on NPR’s World Cafe. “The highly decorated singer-songwriter, instrumentalist, composer, and author is relentlessly busy, so we are thrilled to talk to her about her new album, You’re the One.” You can hear their conversation and a live performance of songs from the Grammy-nominated new album and from earlier albums Freedom Highway and Tomorrow Is My Turn here.

Yussef Dayes tours Boston, Philadelphia, and NYC. The Royal Ballet performs Wayne McGregor and Thomas Adès's The Dante Project. Ambrose Akinmusire tours Sweden with Norrbotten Big Band. Laurie Anderson is in Italy and Luxembourg. Timo Andres and Nico Muhly perform Philip Glass at David Geffen Hall in NYC. The Black Keys are in Mexico City for Corona Capital Festival. Sam Gendel is in Amsterdam. Rhiannon Giddens  performs in Berkeley and Sonoma. Tigran Hamasyan is at Spoleto Jazz Fest in Italy. The Magnetic Fields are in Stockholm and Helsinki. Brad Mehldau Trio tours Chicago, Boston, and College Park. Natalie Merchant is in Italy. Mandy Patinkin concludes London residency. Cécile McLorin Salvant is at Bozar in Brussels. Molly Tuttle & Golden Highway  are in Boston, Long Island, and Pennsylvania, where Yasmin Williams is as well as Rhode Island.

The Staves’ new album, All Now, produced by John Congleton (Sharon Van Etten, Angel Olsen), is due March 22, marking their debut album as the duo of Jessica and Camilla Staveley-Taylor, after their sister Emily’s departure. “There was a delayed reaction to trauma and these big changes out of your control,” Jess says of the period after the February 2021 release of their album Good Woman, as the band—like everyone—was forced to sit with their thoughts. Struggling after two years of deep solitude and pain, The Staves did what they know how to do best: they got back to writing with the idea of going back to basics and focusing almost solely on each other and their guitars as a starting point.

Grammy and Academy Award winner Gustavo Santaolalla—who this week received the Latin Grammy Trustees Award—releases his acclaimed 1998 album Ronroco on vinyl for the first time in a newly remastered edition from Nonesuch on January 26, 2024. The singer, composer, and producer’s classic album—which takes its name from a South American stringed instrument—comprises twelve original tunes inspired by traditional Argentinean music and influenced by music of Japan, Africa, and Eastern Europe. “Ronroco conjures bucolic images and feelings for me,” filmmaker Alejandro Gonzalez Iñarritu writes in the new liner note. “There’s always a note that surprises, breaks the pattern of the rainstorm, turning into silence, a gentle drizzle, or escalating into a tempest.”

Yussef Dayes, who begins a US tour in Brooklyn on Thursday, has shared a live-performance video filmed in the Malibu mountains, backed by a hazy, golden-hour sunset. He and longtime collaborators Rocco Palladino, Venna, Elijah Fox, and Alexander Bourt perform thirty minutes of music from his critically lauded debut album Black Classical Music and more. You can watch it here, along with a performance of the album's title track on BBC Two’s Later… With Jools Holland from Friday.

Cécile McLorin Salvant performs 12th-century trobairitz (female troubadour) Almucs de Castelneau's "Dame Iseut," from her Grammy-nominated new album, Mélusine, accompanied by Sullivan Fortner on harpsichord and Keita Ogawa on percussion, in the Unicorn Tapestries Room at The Met Cloisters in a new video out now as part of The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s performance series, MetLiveArts. This is the third of three performances Salvant filmed in the Met’s Unicorn Tapestry galleries of songs from the album. You can watch it here.

As part of Kronos: Five Decades, the year-long celebration of Kronos Quartet’s 50th anniversary, the group is publishing five decade-spanning playlists curated by its founder and violinist David Harrington. The latest, featuring music Kronos performed in its second decade, 1983–1992, is out now. It includes works the quartet recorded on Nonesuch by Steve Reich, Ornette Coleman, Philip Glass, John Zorn, Henryk Górecki, Kevin Volans, Thomas Tallis, Astor Piazzolla, Jack Body, Terry Riley, and Arvo Pärt. You can hear it on Spotify, Apple Music, and YouTube here.

Congratulations to all of the Nonesuch nominees for the 66th Grammy Awards: the premiere recording of Thomas Adès's Dante, performed by LA Phil and Gustavo Dudamel, for Best Orchestral Performance and Best Contemporary Classical Composition, and the album's producer, Dmitriy Lipay, for Producer of the Year, Classical; Darcy James Argue's Secret Society for Best Large Jazz Ensemble Album for Dynamic Maximum Tension; Julia Bullock for Best Classical Solo Vocal Album for Walking in the Dark; Rhiannon Giddens for Best Americana Album for You're the One and Best American Roots Performance for the album track "You Louisiana Man"; Cécile McLorin Salvant for Best Jazz Vocal Album for Mélusine and Best Arrangement, Instrumental and Vocals for the album track "Fenestra," arranged by Godwin Louis; Molly Tuttle & Golden Highway for Best Bluegrass Album for City of Gold; and The Blue Hour for Best Engineered Album, Classical.

Chris Thile and Punch Brothers launch five-concert variety series at Minetta Lane Theatre in NYC. Hurray for the Riff Raff is across the East River in Brooklyn, as are Molly Tuttle & Golden Highway, who also have shows in Connecticut and Albany. Sam Gendel plays a set at Rockit Festival in the Netherlands, as does Cécile McLorin Salvant, who is also in Austria. Rhiannon Giddens and Silkroad Ensemble tour California; Omar, her Pulitzer Prize–winning opera with Michael Abels, is at SF Opera. Richard Goode gives a solo recital in St. Paul. Mary Halvorson goes to Guimarães, Portugal. Tigran Hamasyan performs in Riga. Kronos Quartet is in DC. The Magnetic Fields is in Rouen and Paris. Brad Mehldau is in Beaverton, Berkeley, and Boise. Natalie Merchant is in Bath. Mandy Patinkin leads a London residency. Vagabon is in Glasgow and Leeds with Weyes Blood. Yasmin Williams is in Chicago and Grand Rapids.