Jeremy Denk was featured on NPR's All Things Considered this weekend. He spoke with host Arun Rath about J.S. Bach's Goldberg Variations and his new recording of it. "The piece is kind of about invention and imagination," says Denk. "In another way, it's like the biggest jazz riff ever written. It's endlessly funny in some ways and endlessly moving in other ways."

Rokia Traoré kicks off a two-week North American tour at Jazz at Lincoln Center's Rose Theater in New York City tonight, as part of the White Light Festival. The nine-city tour includes stops in Vancouver, Seattle, Santa Cruz, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, Toronto, and Montreal. The New York Times' Ben Ratliff calls her new album, Beautiful Africa, "excellent," noting that it "balances rough and smooth, soft and loud, ngoni and chiming electric guitar, lilt and funk," and describes Traoré as "a self-possessed, intense performer." 

Steve Reich's new ensemble work, Radio Rewrite, which draws inspiration from songs by Radiohead, will receive its New York premiere in a concert by Alarm Will Sound at the Metropolitan Museum of Art on Saturday. The all-Reich program also features City Life, New York Counterpoint, and new takes on Six Pianos, Four Genesis Settings from The Cave, and Clapping Music, with the composer joining in. The performance will stream live on Q2Music.

Brad Mehldau kicks off a two-week, 12-city European tour in the new electric duo with drummer Mark Guiliana, Mehliana, in which Mehldau performs on Fender Rhodes and an arsenal of vintage synthesizers while Guiliana accompanies on drums and effects. The Mehliana tour begins with five concerts in France, followed by a set at Barbican Hall in London for the EFG London Jazz Festival and stops in Germany, Italy, Monaco, and Switzerland. You can listen to "Hungry Ghost," off the forthcoming Mehliana album, due in early 2014, here.

The Grammy Award–winning Carolina Chocolate Drops bid farewell to founding member Dom Flemons who is starting a solo career after a special December US tour to commemorate his time with the band. Led by co-founder Rhiannon Giddens, the band will tour throughout 2014 with Hubby Jenkins and two new musicians, cellist Malcolm Parson and mulit-instrumentalist Rowan Corbett, who will join the group in the New Year.

The soundtrack to Inside Llewyn Davis is out now on Nonesuch Records. Written and directed by Academy Award© winners Joel and Ethan Coen and produced by Scott Rudin and Joel and Ethan Coen, the film stars Oscar Isaac, Carey Mulligan, John Goodman, Garrett Hedlund, and Justin Timberlake. Produced by T Bone Burnett, Joel Coen, and Ethan Coen, with Marcus Mumford as its associate producer, the album features 12 new recordings created especially for the film and soundtrack. Also included is a never-before-released recording of Bob Dylan performing his song “Farewell,” which was originally recorded during the sessions for his album The Times They Are A-Changin' and is available exclusively on this soundtrack. 

Devendra Banhart kicks off a three-week tour of Latin America featuring music from his Nonesuch debut album, Mala, with two shows at El Plaza Condesa in Mexico City, tonight (sold out) and Saturday. Banhart and the band—Noah Georgeson, Matthew Compton, Josiah Steinbrick, and Todd Dahlhoff, plus Rodrigo Amarante, who will join after this weekend’s shows—head next to four Brazilian cities, followed by shows in Argentina, Uruguay, Colombia, and Chile. 

Joshua Redman and his Quartet kick off a cross-country tour of the United States with a performance at The Egg in Albany, New York, tonight, followed by stops in Boston, Philadelphia, Santa Cruz, Berkeley, Urbana, Chicago, and Pittsburgh. "As accolades from jazz critic and the public continue to rain down on Redman, he doesn't stand still," says the Times Union, previewing tonight's tour opener. "What fans will see is one of the world's great musical minds at work, in a setting that is sure to have moments that surprise even Redman."

Congratulations to Audra McDonald, whom Musical America has named Musician of the Year, and to Instrumentalist of the Year Jeremy Denk. The Musical America Awards recognize artistic excellence and achievement in the arts and will be presented in a ceremony at Lincoln Center in New York City on December 17.

The Savannah Music Festival has announced the line-up for its 25th anniversary season, to be held March 20–April 5, 2014, and among the artists scheduled to perform are several familiar to readers of the Nonesuch Journal: Punch Brothers; Chris Thile, in a duo concert with fellow mandolinist Mike Marshall; and Fatoumata Diawara and Bombino sharing a double bill for two shows.

Rokia Traoré kicks off a six-date tour of the UK with a performance at the Brighton Corn Exchange tonight, followed by stops in Leeds, Edinburgh, Derry, and Manchester, before culminating in a show at the Royal Festival Hall in London. Traoré and her band then head to New York City to launch a two-week North American tour at Jazz at Lincoln Center for the White Light Festival. Songlines has just named Traoré's new album, Beautiful Africa, among the Best Albums of 2013.

The soundtrack to the forthcoming Coen brothers film Inside Llewyn Davis is due out November 11 on Nonesuch Records. But there's no need to wait till then to hear it: the album is streaming in full all week as an NPR First Listen. "Among many other accomplishments, filmmakers Joel and Ethan Coen helped change the direction of contemporary music with the soundtrack to their 2000 film O Brother, Where Art Thou?," writes NPR's Stephen Thompson. "As with O Brother, music is integral to Inside Llewyn Davis," he continues; the soundtrack functions "both as a stand-alone collection of frequently gorgeous music and as a companion piece to a movie in which many different strains of folk collide as part of a scene taking shape."