Wilco kicked off its North American tour last night at the University of Iowa and is at Roy Wilkins Auditorium in St. Paul, Minnesota, tonight. The band stays on in St. Paul for a live broadcast performance of A Prairie Home Companion with Garrison Keillor on Saturday. Wilco plays the annual Farm Aid benefit concert, which will be broadcast live on DIRECTV and online on Sunday. Jeff Tweedy tells the Austin Chronicle about the joy of playing live, connecting with the audience: "I can't find anything better than that. You can feel it when a song means something to people."

Summer may be the season of festivals, but this fall weekend has two standouts: Austin City Limits and San Francisco's Hardly Strictly Bluegrass, a free outdoor event that has three Nonesuch artists—Emmylou Harris, Allen Toussaint, and Amadou & Mariam—set to perform in Golden Gate Park. Both Harris and Amadou & Mariam have concerts in LA earlier in the week; the latter plays live on KCRW this morning.

Wilco's 1995 debut, A.M., is now out again on vinyl. The band is set to begin a three-week tour this Thursday in the Main Lounge of the University of Iowa's Memorial Union. This afternoon at 3 PM CT, the band stops by the studios of radio station WXRT in their hometown of Chicago to talk about the tour and play guest DJ. The North American tour culminates with two shows in Chicago on October 18 and 19; Wilco heads to Europe in early November.

Paul Jacobs's 1970s recordings of Debussy's Preludes for Nonesuch have been added to The NPR Classical 50 list of essential recordings. On the show, critic Ted Libbey calls them "quite remarkable" and dubs Jacobs "the gold standard for the piano music of Debussy." Says Libbey of the Preludes: "What you hear is so extraordinary."

Youssou N'Dour talks to BBC Radio 4 ... Kronos premieres Damon Albarn piece in Spain ... Gidon Kremer, Kremerata Baltica perform Mendelssohn in Germany ... Low Anthem plays in Germany too ... Joshua Redman Trio launches Indy Jazz Fest ... Chris Thile, Colorado Sympohny give encore performances of his "astounding" Mandolin Concerto ... Allen Toussaint plays New York's Joe's Pub ... Laura Veirs tours with The Decemberists ... Sara Watkins plays the Americana Music Festival in Nashville ... and more ...

Adams's On the Transmigration of Souls, a musical memorial for September 11, will air on WNYC and be performed in concert by the Phoenix Symphony ... Carolina Chocolate Drops celebrate Chapel Hill library's 50th ... Bill Frisell performs music of Disfarmer ... Kronos begins its season at Poland's Wratislava festival ... Low Anthem plays UK's End of the Road fest ... Brad Mehldau solos in São Paolo ... Nicholas Payton plays NY's Iridium  ... Guggenheim presents dances to Reich's Double Sextet ... Allen Toussaint plays Texas, Maryland, NYC ... and more

The Low Anthem stopped by the NPR studios in Washington, DC, this weekend for an appearance on the Sunday edition of All Things Considered for an exploration of their music, which NPR describes as "shimmering Americana." The band discussed their recent Nonesuch debut, Oh My God, Charlie Darwin; listened to a few tracks off the album; and performed "Ticket Taker" live in the studio.

Tune in to NPR's All Things Considered this Sunday, August 30, to hear an interview with and live performance by The Low Anthem.

Christina Courtin's "Foreign Country," off her recent eponymous Nonesuch release, has been chosen as NPR's Song of the Day. "Courtin's self-titled debut is mercilessly charming," says NPR, "a conflation of sweet and sad that manages the neat (and difficult) trick of being endlessly effervescent without inducing tooth decay." The selected song is described as "twinkly, jaunty and blithe," one that "suggests an intriguing future for Courtin."

Regular listeners of NPR may have come to notice that the signature sound of Bill Frisell's guitar can often be heard between segments of the public radio programming. In a profile of the guitarist/composer on this weekend's All Things Considered, NPR suggests that the "evocative, powerful, and often moving" nature of Frisell's work makes it a natural fit, and his latest, Disfarmer, "is no exception."

Christina Courtin will be the guest on today's episode of NPR's World Cafe. Christina will chat with host David Dye about what the show describes as "the beautiful pop style of her self-titled debut," and perform songs from the record, which was released on Nonesuch this spring. Listen online at xpn.org beginning at 2 PM ET today.