Kronos Quartet's latest Nonesuch release is the premiere recording of Terry Riley's The Cusp of Magic, with Wu Man. Dusted credits the composer with having created an "enthralling work from a wide palette of diverse ideas and influences that might well have defeated a lesser composer." The review praises the performers for their ability to "engage and interact in ways that combine earthy energy and celestial delight with an underlying sense of gravity and dignity."

Kronos Quartet's recording of Henryk Górecki's String Quartet No. 3 (" ... songs are sung") tops New Jersey Star-Ledger staff writer Bradley Bambarger's list of the best classical recordings of 2007. Bambarger calls the piece "an intense, 50-minute match for the Polish composer's global '90s hit 'Symphony of Sorrowful Songs,' [Symphony No. 3]," which was recorded by Dawn Upshaw and the London Sinfonietta.

Kronos Quartet has been named Ensemble of the Year by Gramophone China magazine, based on a concert with pipa virtuoso Wu Man this past March at the Shanghai Concert Hall. The program included performances of Tan Dun's Ghost Opera and sections from Terry Riley's The Cusp of Magic. Nonesuch released the studio recording of Kronos and Wu Man performing the former piece in 1997 and will release their recording of the latter piece early next year.

Kronos Quartet's Jeffrey Zeigler is featured in a documentary that will be shown as part of a centennial celebration of the Elationsists—an early 20th-century art movement from San Francisco that found hope in art after the devastation caused by the city's 1906 earthquake. San Francisco's Foundation for the Preservation of Fantastic Possibilities presents a weeklong exhibition beginning tonight that honors the movement's contribution through art, film, photography, poetry, music, and even a signature chocolate drink.

Yes, 'tis the season for year-end "Best of" lists from music critics, and the Nonesuch Journal is sure to let you know about the occasional one or two over the next few weeks. But SF Weekly has decided against the usual critics' list and offers instead "MyTunes"—lists of the year's best according to Bay Area luminaries. Among those weighing in: Kronos Quartet's David Harrington.

The National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences has just announced the nominees for the 50th Annual Grammy Awards, including Nonesuch releases from Wilco, Ry Cooder, Joshua Redman, Stephen Sondheim, and Lorraine Hunt Lieberson. Judith Sherman is up for Classical Producer of the Year, including for Kronos Quartet's recording of Górecki's String Quartet No. 3.

Toronto's new Luminato Festival, which earlier this year, in its inaugural run, presented the world premiere of Philip Glass's Book of Longing, has unveiled its 2008 program, and the Globe and Mail calls it "an ambitious agenda of dance, music, theatre, film, and visual arts." On the bill for the June 6–15 event are the Canadian premieres of Nunavut by Kronos Quartet and Inuit throat singer Tanya Tagaq, and Laurie Anderson's Homeland. 

In a set of performances at Boston's Schubert Theatre last week, the Paul Taylor Dance Company delivered a "sharp, vibrant program," according to the Boston Globe, of two Taylor classics and two pieces receiving their Boston premieres, including Lines of Loss, set to Kronos Quartet's recording of Early Music (Lachryma Antiqua). Writes Thea Singer in her Globe review of the event, Lines of Loss could be seen as the 77-year-old choreographer's reflection on the passage of time, and so the music, fittingly, "weaves through the movement like a scratchy memory." With such a stirring piece, for Singer, the dance's "ending comes almost too soon."

The 2008 Tanglewood season has been announced, and Kronos Quartet is among the Guest Artists taking the stage at the Lenox, Massachusetts, summer home of the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Kronos' Thursday, August 14, program will include John Zorn's Dead Man, Flugufrelsarinn by Sigur Rós, and Steve Reich's Triple Quartet, which the composer wrote for the Quartet in 1998. Tickets go on sale to the public February 17. 

Ballet Theatre Afrikan begins its latest Hooked on Classics series tonight with choreographer Christopher Kindo's Sollopa, featuring the music of Giya Kancheli's Night Prayers by Kronos Quartet, at the University of Johannesburg Arts Centre. According to joburg.org.za, the official site of the city of Johannesburg, Sollopa uses the "mesmerising music" of Night Prayers to tell a tale of magic and passion in a mythical kingdom, through both classical and contemporary dance movement. Ballet Theatre Afrikan premiered the piece in 2004. 

Best known for his contribution to the soundtrack for the 2003 Italian Job remake starring Mark Wahlberg, Brazilian-born DJ Amon Tobin talks to The Moscow Times about a surprising array of influences, from Ennio Morricone to Grandmaster Flash, and about his latest record, Foley Room, on which he looked to Kronos Quartet to record new tracks he could sample. Moscow readers can listen for the Kronos samples at Tobin's show tonight at Ikra.