The original cast album of Adam Guettel’s Broadway musical Days of Wine and Roses, with a book by Craig Lucas, stars Kelli O’Hara and Brian d’Arcy James. This searing musical is based on the 1962 film and original 1958 teleplay of the same name, about a couple falling in love in 1950s New York and struggling against themselves to build their family. Days of Wine and Roses marks the reunion of Guettel and Lucas, who last collaborated on the six-time Tony Award–winning musical The Light in the Piazza. “Repeated listenings compound the amazement,” the New York Times says of Guettel’s work, which “has always offered that kind of challenge—initially leaving a feeling of: Beautiful, but wait, I need to hear it again—and those up for it have a way of coming away shining like Moses down from the Mount. The new score has the same effect.”

"This is my reaction to being assaulted by information," composer and trumpeter Ambrose Akinmusire says of his Nonesuch debut album, Owl Song, featuring a trio with two musicians he has long admired, guitarist Bill Frisell and drummer Herlin Riley. Uncut exclaims: "This is subtly profound music, full of meditative, focused beauty." "A quiet rush of gorgeous sound where space, tone and beauty come together in one of the most impactful albums of 2023," says DownBeat. "This is one of the most interesting recordings to come along in a very long time by one of the most interesting artists of our time."

Kronos Quartet’s acclaimed 1995 album Kronos Quartet Performs Philip Glass gets its first-ever vinyl release in celebration of the group's 50th anniversary. The two-LP set, produced by the composer, Judith Sherman, and Kurt Munkacsi, features violinists David Harrington and John Sherba, violist Hank Dutt, and cellist Joan Jeanrenaud performing quartets No. 2 (Company) (1983), No. 3 (Mishima) (1985), No. 4 (Buczak) (1990), and No. 5 (1991), the first piece Glass wrote for Kronos. “It contains some of Glass's best music since Koyaanisqatsi,” said the New York Times. “His ear for sumptuous string sonorities is undeniable.” The Washington Post called it “an ideal combination of composer and performers.”

“‘Dawning’ has multiple meanings for me,” composer/guitarist Yasmin Williams says of her first song on Nonesuch, featuring Aoife O’Donovan on vocals, Kafari on rhythm bones, and Nic Gareiss’ percussive dancing and provides an early peek at her new album, which the label will release in early 2024: “the dawning of my professional music career and a new love in my personal life, the dawning sky that appeared when I first started writing this song, and me smiling to myself with dawning recognition that I get to create music that I love for a living and share it with the world. This song represents a major shift in how I approach my music and expands the possibilities of what my songs can be.”

On her album Sorry I Haven’t Called, Vagabon (aka Lætitia Tamko) reinvents herself once again with the most playful and adventurous music of her career. Co-produced by Tamko and Rostam (Vampire Weekend, Haim), the album features twelve vibrant tracks she wrote and produced primarily in Germany that channel dance music and effervescent pop through her own confident sensibilities. “This record feels like what I've been working towards,” Tamko says. “It's completely euphoric.”

The Staves’ “You Held It All,” their first new music since the release of their 2021 album, Good Woman, is also the group’s first recording as the duo of Jessica and Camilla Staveley-Taylor, following their sister and bandmate Emily’s stepping back after the birth of her children. Produced by John Congleton in Los Angeles, “‘You Held It All’ is a song about understanding, and the knots we tie ourselves in when we don’t express our truth,” The Staves say, “and how much power and freedom there can be when we do.”

Composer and bandleader Darcy James Argue and his Secret Society ensemble make their Nonesuch Records debut with Dynamic Maximum Tension. The album pays homage to some of Argue’s key influences with original songs dedicated to R. Buckminster Fuller, Alan Turing, and Mae West. Cécile McLorin Salvant joins the ensemble for “Mae West: Advice.” Dynamic Maximum Tension’s eleven tracks, on two CDs, also include a response to Duke Ellington’s “Diminuendo and Crescendo in Blue,” titled “Tensile Curves,” among other originals. Grammy Nominee for Best Large Jazz Ensemble Album.

On multi-instrumentalist Yussef Dayes’ debut solo studio album, Black Classical Music, Dayes’ drum licks and Rocco Palladino’s bass are the anchors, aided by Charlie Stacey (keys/synths), Venna (saxophone), Alexander Bourt (percussion), and a host of features including: Chronixx, Masego, Jamilah Barry, Tom Misch, Elijah Fox, Shabaka Hutchings, Miles James, Sheila Maurice Grey, Nathaniel Cross, Theon Cross, and the Chineke! Orchestra—the first professional orchestra in Europe to be made up of majority Black and ethnically diverse musicians.