While 2008 may go down as one of the more turbulent years in recent (or distant) memory, or, more optimistically, a time of change, there is much to celebrate in the year in music. Nonesuch artists across all genres have contributed to that and, accordingly, have made their way onto many critics' lists of the year's best. For the final Nonesuch Journal article of the year, we offer an overview of just some of that year-end critical praise.

The Mandé Variations, Toumani Diabaté's first solo album in more than two decades, is one of five albums CBS Sunday Morning contributor Bill Flanagan recommends as musical gift ideas "that haven't gotten the attention they deserve." Says Flanagan: "Toumani Diabaté is the master of the kora ... and he has a beautiful new album called The Mandé Variations. After a tough day looking for a parking space at the mall, this album will bring you back to a spirit of peace on Earth."

The Black Keys are getting set to head south for the summer in a two-week tour of Australia, starting December 29 just outside Perth. You can catch some of that in-concert Black Keys energy with their recently released Nonesuch DVD, Live at the Crystal Ballroom, which the Boston Herald recommends it the perfect last-minute gift suggestion and "the next-best thing to seeing this dynamic rock duo in-person," with bonus features behind the scenes "of the awesome Attack & Release."

Elliott Carter's 100th birthday was marked last Thursday at Carnegie Hall and around the world, with celebrations continuing through the weekend and beyond. Los Angeles Times music critic Mark Swed writes, in his review of the Carnegie event: "The world has never known such an artist, one who has reached 100 prolifically making vibrant work for which the wisdom of experience is employed to produce new sensations. History has been made before in Carnegie Hall and centenaries of great composers celebrated, but Thursday’s concert was a first." In London, the Ensemble Intercontemporain's Carter birthday program earns five stars in The Times (UK) and "must be ranked as one of the musical highs of 2008."

The Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra performs the seasonally appropriate Adams nativity oratorio, El Niño ... David Byrne brings his "spectacular show" (Charleston Post & Courier) to Florida ... Elliott Carter's 100th birthday celebration continues at Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, and around the world ... Emmylou Harris considers Kitty Wells on NPR's All Things Considered ... Mandy Patinkin performs Mamaloshen and Broadway's finest at New York's Public Theater ... Chris Thile and Edgar Meyer join Garrison Keillor, Yo-Yo Ma, and Renée Fleming for A Prairie Home Companion ... Wilco plays on with Neil Young then headlines in Baltimore ... and more ...

The McGarrigle Christmas Hour brought more than a little holiday cheer and flair to Carnegie Hall's hallowed Stern Auditorium on Wednesday night. It was a family affair, with Kate and Anna McGarrigle, Kate's children Rufus and Martha Wainwright, their aunt Sloan Wainwright, and many other extended family members by marriage, birth, and longtime friendships, including Emmylou Harris, Laurie Anderson, Lou Reed, Justin Bond, and Jimmy Fallon. The New York Times writes: "Although the program still includes the kind of pristine, ancient-sounding French carols performed by the sisters that used to dominate the show, the younger city folk have added a new flavor."

"Si Naani," the opening track to Toumani Diabaté's 2008 Grammy-nominated album, The Mandé Variations, earns a 95/100 from Jazz.com, which concludes: "This moving 10-minute track, and indeed the whole CD, will leave you anything but restless tonight. This release is an important contribution to Diabaté's oeuvre and is one of the most important recordings of traditional African music in recent memory."

The reissue of the groundbreaking Nonesuch Explorer Series titles from Japan is now complete, with the recent addition of two more titles. The Independent exclaims, "It's wonderful that Nonesuch is reissuing the 92-LP Explorer Series, which put ethnomusicology on the map in the Seventies," and says of the recently reissued Koto Classics: "[I]t's wonderful to hear once more koto master Shinichi Yuize in his prime ... and these classic pieces display [the koto's] suggestive power to the full."

The year that began with the final season of HBO's The Wire and the Nonesuch release of the series' only soundtracks—"... and all the pieces matter": Five Years of Music from "The Wire" and Beyond Hamsterdam: Baltimore Tracks from "The Wire"—now comes to a close with the release of the complete five seasons in a single, 23-DVD box set: "a handsome, thorough and well-appointed cap to the show’s amazing run," says Paste magazine, for what "was the best show on television ... It was—is—a monument."

Kronos Quartet's performance in Carnegie Hall's Zankel Hall on Friday night featured a number of first performances: three New York premieres, including that of Glenn Kotche's Anomaly, and three world premieres. Also on the program was the piece that first launched the group in 1973: George Crumb's Black Angels. The New York Times says, for Kronos, it was "a springboard for an extraordinary career of boundary-breaking discovery and innovation." Friday night's "vivid, powerfully realized staging" added still more to the power of the piece, at one point eliciting "a collective gasp" from the audience.

Following his sold-out concert at Carnegie Hall with Kronos Quartet on Friday night, Glenn Kotche joined his Wilco bandmates for a sold-out show of their own at the Auditorium Theater in Rochester, New York. It was their first-ever performance in the city, leading Rochester Democrat and Chronicle to exclaim: "It was worth the wait ... as spectacular a show as we've seen this year."

The Glass Box, the new 10-CD Nonesuch retrospective of works by Philip Glass, is recommended in The Republican, out of Western Massachusetts,  among "the more notable box sets" of the year, describing it as "one of the most innovative of this year and certainly one of the most musically fascinating." Glass has also announced the initial line-up for his annual Tibet House Benefit Concert at Carnegie Hall in February. Slated to perform are Vampire Weekend, Patti Smith, and The National.