k.d. lang has returned to Canada for several dates on her Watershed tour, including tonight's performance at Centennial Hall in London, Ontario. Across the Atlantic, in the elder London, k.d. was the subject of a feature profile in the Mail on Sunday this past weekend. She talks at length with the Mail's Liz Jones about life, love, religion, and her career. Jones prefaces the discussion by admitting: "I love the new album, Watershed, which is turning out to be her best performing album in the UK in a decade and, in fact, one of the best performers of her 25-year career."

Steve Reich is the featured composer for Tokyo Opera City's Composium 2008, part of the Contemporary Music Festival beginning today and running through Sunday. Ensemble Modern and Synergy Vocals perform in two sold-out, all-Reich concerts at the Opera's Concert Hall, with Brad Lubman conducting, including the Japanese premiere of Daniel Variations as well as a performance of the seminal work Music for 18 Musicians featuring the composer as guest performer. The event also includes a discussion with the composer and the selection of the 2008 Toru Takemitsu Composition Award.

David Byrne, in an op-ed contribution in today's New York Times, reflects on the life of the acclaimed American artist Robert Rauschenberg, who died Monday at the age of 82, recounting his own personal experiences with the man he knew as a friend, a colleague, and an inspiration.

John Adams's latest opera, A Flowering Tree, received its Midwest premiere last night in Chicago's Millennium Park, with the composer conducting. The Chicago Opera Theater production stars Natasha Jouhl as Kumudha, a young girl with the power to turn herself into a flowering tree; Noah Stewart as the Prince; and Sanford Sylvan, who has previously originated leading roles in two Adams operas, as the Storyteller.

John Adams's opera A Flowering Tree receives its Midwest premiere tonight in the Chicago Opera Theater performance at the Harris Theater in Millenium Park. The composer will conduct the opening night performance as well as the second performance, this Saturday. Chicago Tribune critic John von Rhein says the piece offers "the light of hope and renewal" and concludes: "Nobody who loves contemporary opera and music theater can afford to miss it ... Adams' music is luminously beautiful, the entire opera a glorious multicultural paean to the ecology of the soul."

Steve Reich and Glenn Kotche will be among the artists celebrating the unveiling of the re-imagined Alice Tully Hall at Lincoln Center in New York during the two-week Opening Nights Festival, February 22 through March 8, 2009. On March 3, each will take part in New York, New Music, New Hall, a marathon event of new and seminal works. Kotche will join Bang on a Can All-Stars for the NY premiere of one of his compositions, and Steve Reich & Musicians and Synergy Vocals come together for the composer's groundbreaking 1976 work Music for 18 Musicians. Also on the bill is Alarm Will Sound.

Congratulations to Joshua Redman, who was awarded the 2008 Harvard Arts Medal at a ceremony last Thursday evening at the New College Theatre in Cambridge. The Medal honors a distinguished Harvard graduate or faculty member who has achieved excellence in the arts and made a contribution to education or the public good. Redman is the 14th Harvard Arts Medal recipient. Previous honorees include John Adams, Peter Sellars, Yo-Yo Ma, John Harbison, and John Updike.