Keep Your Courage, Natalie Merchant’s tenth solo studio album and the first of new material since her 2014 self-titled record, is due April 14. An eclectic album, produced by Merchant, it features lush orchestrations throughout, two duets sung with vocalist Abena Koomson-Davis of Resistance Revival Chorus, contributions from the Celtic folk group Lúnasa and Syrian clarinetist Kinan Azmeh, and horn arrangements by jazz trombonist Steve Davis. There are nine original songs by Merchant and an interpretation of a song by Ian Lynch of the Irish band Lankum. The vinyl LP edition includes four bonus tracks from earlier albums, previously unreleased on vinyl. Merchant will tour the US in the spring and fall. 

I Love a Love Song!, the second album from Rachael & Vilray—Lake Street Dive singer/songwriter Rachael Price and composer, singer, and guitarist Vilray—is due January 13. It features eleven new songs written by Vilray plus the 1930s classic "Goodnight My Love" written by Mack Gordon and Harry Revel. The album was produced, engineered, and mixed by Dan Knobler and features arrangements from Jacob Zimmerman. Nonesuch Store pre-orders include an exclusive autographed print in one of four colors selected at random. A new song, “Is a Good Man Real?,” debuts today; you can watch a video for it, filmed in the studio, here.

The first studio recording of Tyondai Braxton's Telekinesis—an eighty-seven-piece work for electric guitars, orchestra, choir and electronics—is out now on New Amsterdam / Nonesuch Records. The album features the Metropolis Ensemble conducted by Andrew Cyr, the Brooklyn Youth Chorus conducted by Dianne Berkun Menaker, and chamber choir The Crossing conducted by Donald Nally performing what the Guardian calls "a superpower-themed symphony … a titanic composition." Braxton cites the Japanese manga classic Akira as a thematic guide, with its story of a young boy's discovery of his telekinetic powers and his inability to control it, leading to his own destruction. The Times exclaims: "It's remarkable."

Voices of Bishara, the new album from drummer, composer, and producer Tom Skinner (The Smile, Sons of Kemet) and the first recording under his own name, is out now via Brownswood / International Anthem / Nonesuch. "Voices of Bishara is one of the top three jazz albums of 2022 so far and it would take the second comings of John Coltrane, Charles Mingus, Horace Silver and Lee Morgan to threaten to dislodge it," exclaims All About Jazz in a five-star review. "Voices of Bishara is a terrific affirmation of what makes Skinner so interesting as both a drummer and now a composer," says Treble. "It’s a thrilling, lively record and one of the best jazz releases this year."

Makaya McCraven has released a Hi-Res live EP, International Anthem @ Public Records (Volume 3), available exclusively on Qobuz. The set was recorded live at Brooklyn's Public Records on September 19, 2022, for which McCraven assembled a unique ensemble with a string quartet to perform special arrangements of songs from his new album, In These Times. "It was really fun doing pared down versions of these songs in such an intimate space," McCraven says, "especially with so many close friends and family in the house." You can watch a live video of "Dream Another" from the set here.

Tom Skinner has released “The Journey,” the latest single from his forthcoming new album, Voices of Bishara, out November 4, as well as a live performance video of the track, featuring himself on drums and percussion, Tom Herbert on acoustic bass, Kareem Dayes on cello, Chelsea Carmichael and Robert Stillman on tenor saxophone, and Paul Camo on samples. You can hear the new song and watch the video, filmed last month at St. Luke’s Church in West Holloway, London, here.

The Blue Hour, a song cycle collaboration among composers Rachel Grimes, Angélica Negrón, Shara Nova, Caroline Shaw, and Sarah Kirkland Snider, is out now on New Amsterdam / Nonesuch Records. The piece was commissioned and performed by the chamber orchestra A Far Cry, who are joined by singer Shara Nova. Set to excerpts from Carolyn Forché’s epic poem On Earth, the music follows one woman’s journey through the liminal space between life and death via thousands of hallucinatory and non-linear images. You can take a quick look inside the album here.

"Finally bringing this recording to your ears, after so many years ... is a tremendous exhale and a collective accomplishment made possible by many small and many giant acts of generosity," Shara Nova writes in a new essay about the creation of The Blue Hour, a song cycle collaboration among composers Rachel Grimes, Angélica Negrón, Caroline Shaw, Sarah Kirkland Snider, and Nova, who performs the piece with the commissioning chamber orchestra A Far Cry on the album out this Friday.

Rhiannon Giddens’s book debut, Build a House, is out today on Candlewick Press. The picture book was inspired by, and features the lyrics of, a song she wrote and recorded with Yo-Yo Ma to commemorate Juneteenth in 2020. A newly recorded version of “Build a House” with Ma and Francesco Turrisi is also out today on Nonesuch; you can watch the video here. Giddens will read the book and perform at the Brooklyn Children’s Museum October 13 and The Grammy Museum in LA October 22. Her Carnegie Hall Perspectives concerts begin October 15; her opera Omar with Michael Abels debuts at LA Opera October 22.

Rachael & Vilray—Lake Street Dive singer/songwriter Rachael Price and the guitarist/singer/songwriter Vilray—return with “Just Me This Year,” written by Vilray, about the pleasures of spending the winter holidays alone after a welcome romantic breakup. Vilray says: “For those who happen to be going it alone this time of year, we’re here to help you embrace the freedom!” The duo's next album will come in 2023; details soon. They will perform at the storied Carlyle Hotel in NYC over the Thanksgiving weekend, on Friday and Saturday, November 25 and 26.

The Staves' debut album, Dead & Born & Grown, turns ten November 12, and to mark the occasion, Nonesuch Records will release the album on 180-gram recycled colored vinyl in the US December 2. This follows its UK release on October 15, the UK’s National Album Day, for which the band will be ambassadors. Produced with Glyn and Ethan Johns (The Beatles, The Rolling Stones), Dead & Born & Grown was met with great critical acclaim and set the Staveley-Taylor sisters on the way to becoming one of the UK’s most celebrated indie exports. The recycled vinyl is made from 100% PVC recycled material, using waste material and clippings from previous record pressings, resulting in a unique color combination for each LP.

The first recordings of Steve Reich’s Runner (2016) and Music for Ensemble and Orchestra (2018), performed by the Los Angeles Philharmonic and conducted by Susanna Mälkki, are out now digitally and on CD; vinyl is due December 2. The New York Times calls Runner “a calmly luminous orchestral piece with the pulsating, propulsive rhythms that animate much of Mr. Reich’s music.” The San Francisco Chronicle says that Music for Ensemble and Orchestra “is a beautiful and dramatically charged masterpiece, but its impact goes even further than that.”