As reported yesterday in the Nonesuch Journal, Natalie Merchant is set to make her Nonesuch debut with the April release of Leave Your Sleep. Tonight, fans in the UK can catch Natalie on the inaugural episode of the new BBC arts and culture discussion television program The Review Show, which airs live on BBC Two at 11 PM. She'll be the show's first music guest. Next week, Natalie performs live in Dublin and Glasgow.

As The Low Anthem digs in at work on its next album, NPR has posted the band's Tiny Desk Concert performance, including "To the Ghosts Who Write History Books" off its Nonesuch debut, Oh My God, Charlie Darwin. Another song from the album is part of Paste's "Songs for Haiti" project, offering free downloads for those who donate to support relief efforts in Haiti.

Kate McGarrigle, one half of a famed folk music duo with her sister Anna, has died of sarcoma at the age of 63. The sisters' last full-length album was the 2005 Nonesuch release The McGarrigle Christmas Hour, featuring family and friends, including Kate’s children Martha and Rufus Wainwright. Donations in Kate's name are being accepted at the Kate McGarrigle Fund, which raises money and awareness for the fight against sarcoma.

The Carolina Chocolate Drops have added a special performance to their tour schedule: an Emergency Benefit Concert for Haiti at New York's City Winery this Wednesday with Patti Smith, The Swell Season, John Wesley Harding, Yo La Tengo, Young People’s Choir of New York City, Joshua Bell, and others. Proceeds go to Doctors Without Borders, Partners in Health, and the Jewish Renaissance Medical Center's emergency mobile hospital unit.

The Magnetic Fields' latest release, Realism, is out now. The BBC says the album confirms Stephin Merritt's "stature as the most inventive rhymer in the American lineage since Tom Lehrer," its sound "absolutely prime Merritt ... consistently confirming what unusually inventive arrangers Merritt and his cohorts are." MusicOMH‬‪ gives it four stars, saying Merritt's "talent for bathing his songs in wonderful arrangements and limpet-like melodies seals his genius status."

The Low Anthem will be making its US television debut with an appearance on the Late Show with David Letterman tonight. The band will be performing "Charlie Darwin" off its Nonesuch debut, Oh My God, Charlie Darwin. The episode is sure to be additionally special, as Letterman will be celebrating the 10th anniversary of his successful quintuple bypass heart surgery by speaking his surgeon, O. Wayne Isom.

Allen Toussaint celebrates his 72nd birthday today. He received an early birthday gift when he was awarded the Grand Prix, Best Disc of the Year, from France's Académie du Jazz, for his 2009 Nonesuch debut, The Bright Mississippi. The awards ceremony took place this past Tuesday in Paris with members of the Ministry of Culture and a diverse array of artists in attendance.

The Low Anthem performed at Saturday's multi-artist Hot Stove Cool Music benefit concert in Boston; the Boston Globe included the set among the event's highlights, calling the group "a dazzlingly talented bunch." Now comes word that the band will be headlining its first North American tour this spring and making its US television debut on the Late Show with David Letterman this Thursday. It will also spend much of February supporting The Avett Brothers on the road.

Oumou Sangare and Audra McDonald have been nominated for NAACP Image Awards: Oumou for her latest album, Seya, and Audra for her work on the ABC series Private Practice. Audra will be performing on ABC tonight, singing "God Bless America" during the pregame show at the National Championship football game in Pasadena's Rose Bowl Stadium.

Steve Reich will join So Percussion in a performance of Clapping Music for an all-Reich program at Stanford University this Saturday. The concert, featuring the US premiere of Reich's latest piece, Mallet Quartet, is the culmination of a number of related events at Stanford this week, including a public conversation with Reich and Beryl Korot. The San Jose Mercury News calls it all "a welcome and rare opportunity for immersion in Reich's rhythmical realm."

While The Low Anthem has been busy prepping its next album, documenting it all on video, Magnet magazine named its Nonesuch debut, Oh My God, Charlie Darwin, the 2009 Album of the Year, "a thrilling, romantic journey through Americana at its absolute finest." This month, the band begins its WOXY radio show and a European tour; its later US tour with the Avett Brothers has already begun to sell out.

k.d. lang releases her first-ever career retrospective, Recollection, 25 years after the release of her debut recording. The two-disc set will be available February 2 [now February 9] on Nonesuch. Recollection features 22 of lang’s most beloved recordings including an all-new interpretation of the Leonard Cohen classic “Hallelujah." The deluxe package includes a third disc of previously unreleased recordings—many performed live—as well as a bonus DVD of music videos and rarely seen live performance footage.