The Low Anthem's Nonesuch debut, Oh My God, Charlie Darwin, is out today. The album receives a Paste rating of 90 and is described in the review as "gorgeous chamber folk," another step in "the evolution of folk music ... following the path cleared by Nick Drake and Tim Buckley." Paste concludes: "[T]hese 12 songs are exquisite." The Boston Phoenix hears ties to Tom Waits's Mule Variations in this "excellent" new record, "moving gently among sepia-toned arrangements of pump organs and clarinets and gruff barnyard blues."

Oumou Sangare, the Malian singer/songwriter known as the "Songbird," has released Seya, her first international release in six years. Toronto's Globe and Mail says the album's title, meaning "joy," is certainly reflected in the music, calling it "modern Malian music at its finest: sophisticated, subtle, beautifully produced ... Its cross-rhythms and flowing, hypnotic instrumental lines underpin all she does, and all she does on Seya, whether crooning, chanting, chuckling or singing with majestic power, is excellent."

The Low Anthem's Nonesuch debut, Oh My God, Charlie Darwin, is set for release tomorrow. The album's first track, "Charlie Darwin," opens this week's episode of NPR's All Songs Considered. "If you listen to just one song today," insists the show's host, Bob Boilen, "make it this opening track to the new CD by The Low Anthem. It all starts off with a sound that at times feels Gospel and then at the very same time feels agnostic. Those two ideas seem at odds with one another, but then the title of the record's called Oh My God, Charlie Darwin."

Nonesuch releases Pulitzer Prize–winning composer John Adams’s Doctor Atomic Symphony on July 28, 2009. A purely instrumental work, the piece is drawn from Adams’s opera Doctor Atomic. David Robertson conducts the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra on this recording. Said the New York Times: "[T]he score invites you to hear the music—driving passages with pounding timpani, quizzically restrained lyrical flights, bursts of skittish fanfares—on its own terms, apart from its dramatic context." Also on the album is Adams’ 2001 piece, Guide to Strange Places.

Nonesuch Records and PS Classics are proud to announce the release of the original cast recording of Stephen Sondheim and John Weidman’s Road Show—from 2008's Public Theater production featuring Alexander Gemignani and Michael Cerveris—on June 30, 2009. New York magazine described the musical as "a boisterous picaresque about two brothers flimflamming their way from the Yukon to Boca Raton at the turn of the 20th century." Road Show was directed by John Doyle, the score conducted by Mary-Mitchell Campbell and orchestrated by Jonathan Tunick, and was produced by Tommy Krasker.

Wilco's new album, Wilco (the album), is due out on Nonesuch in another month, and the critical response has already begun, including, this week, from the band's two hometown papers, the Chicago Tribune and the Chicago Sun-Times. The Sun-Times gives the album 3.5 stars, asserting that "the band has cemented a reputation as one of the most creative forces in rock today" and concluding that its new songs "stand beside the best that the band has given us." The Tribune calls the band's current members "the most technically accomplished of Wilco’s many lineups ... and Wilco (the album) is a compendium of its best moves."

Kronos Quartet's latest album, Floodplain, is out today. On the album, the Quartet explores vintage pop from Egypt, folk from Azerbaijan, electronica from a Palestinian music collective, and an ambitious piece from Serbian composer Aleksandra Vrebalov. The Independent (UK) gives it four stars, calling it "a one-world project handled with suitably welcoming passion and respect." The Oregonian says the evocative metaphor of the album's title is apt for this adventurous group. "Think of Floodplain as creative fertility, as only Kronos can do ... It feels unusually current, even politically current, with music from parts of the world we often only read about. That's what we love about this string quartet: playing that is exploratory, fearless and full of intent."

Wilco (the album) is set for a June 30 release from Nonesuch Records, on CD and a vinyl LP, and is now available for pre-order in the Nonesuch Store. The LP is pressed on audiophile-quality, 180-gram vinyl and includes the full album on CD as well. For a sneak peek, visit the band's site, wilcoworld.net, where the complete album is now streaming. American Songwriter says it's well worth checking out: "[W]e’ve heard the record, and we can tell you it’s worth listening to over a pay phone submerged underwater. It’s that good."

Wilco (the album) is due out June 30 on Nonesuch, and Billboard offers a hint of what's to come, stating that, "musically, Wilco (the album) offers a little bit of everything while making good on frontman Jeff Tweedy's stated goal to use 'the studio as another instrument.'" The article offers insight on each of the album's tracks, including its "majestic" closer and "a gorgeous duet" with Feist. Blurt magazine's review of the band's new concert DVD, Ashes of American Flags, compares it favorably to Scorsese's The Last Waltz, leading the reviewer to commit to Wilco as "the greatest American rock 'n' roll band."

Dawn Upshaw and pianist Gilbert Kalish performed at Boston's Jordan Hall on Sunday afternoon, in what the Boston Globe calls a "memorable" recital. "She is, indisputably, a great singer, with a voice that radiates power and unforced warmth," says the Globe. "But her secret weapon is a casual, unpretentious demeanor that lessens the distance between stage and audience. Listeners in her presence experience music not as the inaccessible product of a holy art but as a thing of open, approachable beauty." Later this month, Nonesuch will reissue, as MP3 albums, exclusively in the Nonesuch Store, five recordings of the Haydn piano sonatas Kalish made for the label between 1975 and 1980.

Today marks the release of Richard Goode's first-ever recording of the complete Beethoven piano concertos, with the Budapest Festival Orchestra and conductor Iván Fischer. In a perfect five-star review of the recording, the Financial Times declares it a "landmark recording of the Beethoven concertos." The review continues: "Goode makes the familiar sound unexpectedly fresh. He plays without mannerism, without stylistic quirks, without making anything sound predictable." Goode performs solo works by Bach and Chopin tonight at Carnegie Hall.

Richard Goode's recording of all five Beethoven piano concertos with the Budapest Festival Orchestra and conductor Iván Fischer, is set for release on Nonesuch this week. The New York Times examines both the new set and Goode's earlier recordings in an in-depth look at the pianist's career and his extensive history with the label, describing it as "a long and productive affiliation ... that any musician would envy." Even in an earlier time when such relationships were perhaps less rare, "Mr. Goode would have stood out for his fastidious musicianship, infallible fingers, warming spirit and vital connection to the living traditions set down by his predecessors."