The Magnetic Fields cross into Canada ... Carolina Chocolate Drops close out UK tour ... Christina Courtin opens for Josh Rouse in NYC, Philly ... Bill Frisell unveils his Baghdad/Seattle Suite in Minneapolis ... Richard Goode, Jonathan Biss give duo recital in Boston ... Kronos performs in Chicago, New Jersey ... The Low Anthem continues European tour ... Brad Mehldau goes solo at Harvard ... Pat Metheny sets up in Scandinavia ... Punch Brothers play benefit in LA ... Joshua Redman's James Farm plays Istanbul, Milan ... Sara Watkins winds down UK tour ... Wilco kicks off world tour in Montana ... and more ...

Kronos Quartet performs at the McAninch Arts Center outside Chicago tonight. On the program are pieces from the group's latest release, Floodplain, including Aleksandra Vrebalov's ... hold me, neighbor, in this storm ..., which the Seattle Weekly recently called a "compelling, emotionally far-ranging tone poem." The A.V. Club Chicago spoke with Kronos's David Harrington about introducing audiences to new sounds. "The things that we do," he says, "are, hopefully, the beginnings of explorations for other people."

The Low Anthem's European tour continues through next week. In a recent performance, says The Guardian, the band gave "a real barn-burner, swapping instruments with giddy abandon, and ­rattling through a set-list that swayed ­between tender, harmonious folk songs and ramshackle rock 'n' roll with sweaty, unstudied authenticity." The paper profiles the group and examines its success at respecting the past while creating something new.

The Carolina Chocolate Drops' tour of the UK brings the band to London for a performance at Bush Hall tonight. The concert is a Critics' Choice from Time Out London, which finds the band "drawing on Carolina's vibrant musical heritage to play high energy bluegrass with a jazzy twist." The Guardian, in a four-star review of a recent show, says "it is the interaction between the members, swapping ­instruments and harmony lines on the fly, that makes them such a joy to watch."

Wilco begins its world tour at the University of Montana's Adams Center in Missoula this Sunday. Concerts in the American Pacific Northwest and into Canada follow, leading to the band's free LiveCity Vancouver performance as part of the festivities surrounding the 2010 Olympic Winter Games. The band has now added several tour stops in Europe this May, including shows in Finland, Sweden, Denmark, Spain, and Italy.

David Byrne will present his video/audio lecture called Creation in Reverse at Bowery Ballroom in New York City tonight as part of the Stories in High Fidelity reading and music series. There will also be a special music performance by Nicole Atkins, a featured vocalist on Byrne's forthcoming Todomundo/Nonesuch release, Here Lies Love, which is available for pre-order now in the Nonesuch Store.

The Carolina Chocolate Drops are in the UK all this week to celebrate the early release there of their Nonesuch debut, Genuine Negro Jig, and perform throughout the country. It's been a whirlwind of BBC appearances, including a live BBC 6 Music interview earlier today on Nemone's early afternoon show and a performance on BBC Radio 4's Loose Ends last Saturday.

The Magnetic Fields begins its two-month tour with music from Realism at DC's Lisner Auditorium Thursday. The album opener opens the latest edition of NPR's All Songs Considered. The Christian Science Monitor recommends the album, citing Stephin Merritt's "delicately crafted pop songs with wit and deft musicality"; the Cleveland Plain Dealer gives it an A-, calling it "a fun exercise in faux-folk." Merritt speaks with the CBC about his music and his thoughts on the singing skills of label mate k.d. lang.

Alarm Will Sound will be joining Dirty Projectors for two special shows later this month, performing the latter band's The Getty Address at Lincoln Center's Allen Room in NYC and at Walt Disney Concert Hall in LA. In between these shows, Alarm Will Sound will perform music by Caleb Burhans at NYC's Poisson Rouge. This summer, the group will be featured in the first-ever Mizzou New Music Summer Festival.

Natalie Merchant was in Ireland and Scotland last week to perform songs from her forthcoming Nonesuch debut, Leave Your Sleep. The Scotsman gives four stars to her Glasgow Celtic Connections performance, saying the set "gave full rein to the mercurial potency" of her voice. The Irish Times says that through her set at Whelan's in Dublin, she remained "the apple of everyone’s eye—and rightly so." Chronogram says the new album's "genius is in how Merchant pairs the poems with just the right accompaniment."

Pat Metheny kicked off his Orchestrion tour in France this weekend and has now added stops in Asia in June. The New York Times calls Metheny "easily one of the most enterprising jazz musicians of his generation" and says of seeing it all in action that "the performance dazzled," not least the album's "shimmering, labyrinthine title track, an overture of palpable ambition." Billboard says Orchestrion "surprises and exhilarates." The Cleveland Plain Dealer gives it an A-; the Detroit Free Press says Metheny opens up "new avenues of creativity."

Grammy Weekend is here with Wilco, Allen Toussaint, Shawn Colvin, Amadou & Mariam, and Oumou Sangare up for awards; Wilco, Emmylou Harris, and k.d. lang celebrate Neil Young in concert ... Kronos Quartet, Tanya Tagaq perform for Vancouver Cultural Olympiad ... Carolina Chocolate Drops tours UK ... Christina Courtin plays acoustic at NYC's Rubin Museum ... Low Anthem tours Benelux ... Pat Metheny unveils Orchestrion in France ... Mandy Patinkin premieres new play at Yale Rep ... Sara Watkins goes Transatlantic at Celtic Connections ... and more ...