Cal Performances at the University of California, Berkeley, has announced its 2011–12 season, which will feature performances from a number of performers familiar to readers of the Nonesuch Journal: Dawn Upshaw and Rokia Traoré, each in a collaboration with director Peter Sellars, the latter also with novelist Toni Morrison; Kronos Quartet in the Bay Area premiere of Steve Reich's WTC 9/11; Sérgio and Odair Assad; and Richard Goode.

Natalie Merchant's performance at the Cambridge Folk Festival earlier this month will be featured on the UK's Sky Arts TV Saturday night, which also includes interviews with Natalie and with Carolina Chocolate Drops, plus performances from the Drops and Rokia Traoré. Merchant's US tour stops in Texas this weekend. The Arizona Republic says: "Her ambitious touring and recording project shows an artist who continues to evolve and push herself."

Natalie Merchant, Carolina Chocolate Drops, and Rokia Traoré performed recently at the 45th annual Cambridge Folk Festival in Cambridge, England. BBC Radio 2's festival highlights program features interviews and live performances by all three both artists. Press coverage of the festival included praise for the performances.

The 45th annual Cambridge Folk Festival gets under way tonight at Cherry Hinton Hall in Cambridge, England, and three Nonesuch artists are set to take the stage there this weekend: Natalie Merchant headlines Saturday night, Carolina Chocolate Drops perform both Saturday and Sunday, and Rokia Traoré performs on Sunday. BBC Radio 2 will broadcast highlights next Wednesday.

Rokia Traoré concludes her UK tour in Coventry tonight. The tour began ten days ago at Koko in London, a performance to which The Guardian, The Independent, and the Evening Standard all give four stars. The Guardian calls it "an exhilarating performance." The Independent says Traoré was "a captivating performer" throughout. The Evening Standard says, "when she rocked, she really rocked."

Rokia Traoré kicks off a ten-day UK tour in London tonight, with Sweet Billy Pilgrim opening all along the tour. Traoré spoke with The Times, which calls her latest album, Tchamantché, "easily one of the best albums of 2008," and the Evening Standard, which calls it "a wondeful work" that "deserves to belong in every home." Time Out recommends the live show, as does the Guardian, which calls her band "both intricate and melodically accessible, her impressive singing voice pointing the way."

Rokia Traoré kicks off a four-week spring tour of the United States and the UK this weekend with a Saturday night set at the Stewart Theatre in Raleigh, North Carolina. She will spend the next week playing up and down the East Coast of the US, followed by a UK leg starting later this month. For the UK dates, Traoré will be joined by Mercury Prize-nominated British trio Sweet Billy Pilgrim.

Rokia Traoré's latest Nonesuch release, Tchamantché, was released in early 2009 and made a lasting impression, finding its way to year-end best-of lists, including that of the New York Times's Jon Pareles, who remarked on Traoré's "preternatural grace." She now prepares to take her music on the road, as she announces a spring tour of the United States and the United Kingdom set for April and May.

Two New York Times music critics have Nonesuch albums on their Top Ten lists: Rokia Traoré's Tchamantché and Oumou Sangare's Seya. The Washington Post has Alarm Will Sound's a/rhythmia in its Top Ten classical albums; the Denver Post has Richard Goode and John Adams. Two Boston Globe critics have Wilco (the album) on their lists, while others there add BlakRoc and Seya. MTV includes Wilco plus Amadou & Mariam's Welcome to Mali. PopMatters and American Songwriter cite Wilco as well, while the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle lists Allen Toussaint's The Bright Mississippi.

The Wall Street Journal sees Allen Toussaint's The Bright Mississippi as an example of "cause for optimism" in music this year. The Sunday Times places Amadou & Mariam's Dimanche à Bamako among the best pop/rock music of the '00s. Time Out includes Oumou Sangare's Seya and Christina Courtin's debut among the year's best albums and NYC performances by Toumani Diabaté and Wilco among the year's best shows. In "a phenomenal decade for world music," says WNYC, Ali Farka Touré's Savane is among the decade's best, with Youssou N'Dour's Egypt at No. 1.

Foundation Passerelle, the organization founded by Rokia Traoré to help her fellow Malians prepare for careers in music, has been awarded the first-ever Roskilde Festival World Music Award. Rokia will accept the 30,000 euro award, on the foundation's behalf, from the Lord Mayor of Copenhagen at the Womex world music conference on November 1. She had already been scheduled to attend this year's Womex to speak about the foundation.

Rokia Traoré was the featured artist on this past weekend's Transpacific Sound Paradise on New York independent radio station WFMU. Listen in to hear tracks from Rokia's latest Nonesuch release, Tchamantché, and an interview with the Malian-born singer/songwriter about the new sounds she explores on the album.