The line-up for the 2012 American Songbook series from Lincoln Center has been announced, and among the artists performing are mandolinist Chris Thile and guitarist Michael Daves. The duo will perform songs from their debut album, Sleep with One Eye Open, at The Allen Room in Frederick P. Rose Hall, overlooking New York's Central Park, on Thursday, January 12. Tickets are go on sale to the general public on November 14. Friends of Lincoln Center will be given early access on November 3. 

Laurie Anderson performs at Other Voices NYC: A Celebration of Music and Literature benefit concert ... Björk continues Biophilia residency in Reykjavik ... Carolina Chocolate Drops' Dom Flemons performs solo in Chicago ... Richard Goode joins the LA Philharmonic for Mozart ... Wanda Jackson tours Switzerland ... Gidon Kremer joins the Boston Symphony Orchestra for Schumann ... Audra McDonald performs two NY benefit concerts ... Pat Metheny Trio is in Budapest, as is Steve Reich ... Stephen Sondheim talks in Costa Mesa ... Rokia Traoré performs Desdemona in Berkeley ... and more ... 

As Björk's fully sold-out Biophilia residency in Reykjavik continues, we are happy to announce that one lucky fan has won a trip for two to the closing-night performance on November 7. Congratulations to Justin Allan from Seattle! The Wall Street Journal's Speakeasy blog, reviewing the show, says Björk "gave a commanding performance ... sharing the joy of a magical evening." The Onion's A.V. Club says that "the mix of concert and performance art was easily summarized: stunning." The New York Times calls the larger Biophilia project "among the most creative, innovative and important new projects in popular culture."

Randy Newman will play three UK concerts as part of a European tour in February and March 2012 to coincide with the release of the CD/DVD album package Randy Newman: Live in London in November. The tour includes dates in Gateshead, Glasgow, and London, as well as cities in Belgium, Ireland, Germany, the Netherlands, Denmark and Switzerland.

Alarm Will Sound will be the Artists-in-Residence at the third annual Mizzou New Music Summer Music Festival, held in July at the University of Missouri. Eight composers from around the world will be selected through a portfolio application process to compose a work to be performed by Alarm Will Sound. The application deadline is November 1. Donnacha Dennehy will be a guest composer, participating in discussions and master classes.

The line-up for the 2012 Celtic Connections festival in Glasgow, Scotland, was announced today and among the artists on this year's line-up are the Carolina Chocolate Drops and Punch Brothers. The Nonesuch Records label mates are playing a double header show together at O2 ABC 1 Glasgow on January 20. Both bands are playing their own headliner shows in London that week; Punch Brothers also join Amos Lee for several shows in Europe then.

Gidon Kremer returned to Lincoln Center in New York on Saturday for the second-annual White Light Festival, "an exploration of music’s power to illuminate our interior lives," to present a program titled Homage to J.S. Bach. The program centered around Bach's Chaconne for solo violin and included the US premiere of Silvestrov's Dedication to J.S. Bach. The New York Times calls the Bach piece "as transcendent a work as you will find." Kremer joins the Boston Symphony Orchestra this week at Boston's Symphony Hall for works by Schumann and Strauss.

Audra McDonald brought her US tour to a place where the four-time Tony Award winner is quite at home—the New York City stage—when she performed at Carnegie Hall Saturday night. The New York Times' Stephen Holden calls McDonald "a one-of-a-kind musical super-talent" who received "an unbroken wave of adoration" from the Carnegie Hall crowd. This echoes the Los Angeles Times' recent concert review, which says: "Audra McDonald is amazing ... one in a million."

Audra McDonald—"one in a million" (LA Times)—performs at Carnegie Hall ... Laurie Anderson does Delusion in Providence ... Alarm Will Sound plays NY's SONiC Festival ... Björk brings Biophilia to Reykjavik ... The Black Keys are in Seattle ... Carolina Chocolate Drops, Richard Goode play Wisconsin ... Wanda Jackson closes out US tour in North Carolina ... Gidon Kremer celebrates Bach at Lincoln Center ... Kronos Quartet plays WOMAD in Australia ... k.d. lang is out West ... The Low Anthem closes out US tour in Boston ... Jessica Lea Mayfield supports the Avett Brothers in Arizona ... Brad Mehldau, Joshua Redman close out duo tour at SFJAZZ ... Natalie Merchant gives benefit concert in upstate NY ... Pat Metheny Trio launches European tour ... Sara Watkins takes Watkins Family Hour to Texas ... and more ...

Pat Metheny, fresh off his US tour with bassist Larry Grenadier, launches a 30-city European tour this weekend with Grenadier and fellow Pat Metheny Trio member Bill Stewart, on drums. This is the first time in nearly a dozen years that the Trio behind the albums Pat Metheny Trio 99>00 and Trio Live will have toured Europe. MPR, reviewing Metheny's new solo album, What's It All About, says: "Metheny has redefined how jazz is played on the guitar." The forthcoming reissue of his 1999 duo album with Jim Hall, announced in yesterday's Nonesuch Journal, is available to pre-order.

Björk continues to celebrate the release of her new album, Biophilia, with the latest show in her Reykjavik residency tonight. New York magazine found her "pitch-perfect" at Sunday's show. She is the subject of a Q&A with Mashable and a feature article in the Los Angeles Times, which says that, with Biophilia, Björk "has reinvented the album into a transformative transmedia experience." The San Francisco Chronicle says she "has come up with her most compelling work in eons"; "the results are extraordinarily sumptuous and seductive." The Philadelphia Inquirer calls it "eerily beautiful."

Irish composer Donnacha Dennehy, whose Nonesuch debut album, Grá agus Bás, was released earlier this year, is in Chicago for the performance of his 2002 piece To Herbert Brun. Musicians from the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, led by conductor Cliff Colnot, kick off the 2011/12 season of the CSO's MusicNOW new-music series with tonight's concert, held at the Harris Theater. Dennehy's piece features guest soprano Carrie Henneman Shaw. The program also include works by John Corigliano, Kirsten Broberg, Alejandro Viñao, and Paula Matthusen.