Natalie Merchant was on NPR's World Cafe to talk with host Kallao about her new album, Keep Your Courage, and give intimate performances of four songs from it: "Come On, Aphrodite," "Narcissus," "Big Girls," and "Tower of Babel." "It's a beautiful record that revolves around love in its many forms," says Kallao. "She calls it like she sees it, and that's a guest you feel lucky to speak with. And I think you'll dig hearing it." You can do that here.

Cécile McLorin Salvant stopped by Amoeba Music in San Francisco for a shopping trip and a chat for Amoeba’s What’s in My Bag? series, in which she picks up an expectedly eclectic selection of music by Puccini, Georgia Anne Muldrow, Charlie Parker, Abbey Lincoln, Björk (“I love her. She inspires me deeply.”), Patty Waters, Love, El Camarón De La Isla with Paco De Lucía, MF Doom, Chaka Khan, and Meat Puppets. You can take a look inside and hear what she has to say about her picks here.

Rhiannon Giddens, Music Director for this weekend's Ojai Music Festival in California, takes part in a number of performances streaming live from Ojai at ojaifestival.org. Laurie Anderson is in Madrid and London. Timo Andres performs Chopin and Joplin in Brooklyn. Emmylou Harris is in Denver with Dwight Yoakam. Hurray for the Riff Raff gives theatrical performance of 2017's The Navigator at Joe’s Pub in NYC. Cécile McLorin Salvant is in Hamburg. Sarah Kirkland Snider's Mass for the Endangered gets West Coast premiere in Portland.

The Royal Conservatory of Music’s Koerner Hall in Toronto has announced its 2023–24 concert season—the venue’s fifteenth anniversary season—including performances from Rhiannon Giddens, Brad Mehldau, Laurie Anderson, Kronos Quartet, and Richard Goode.

The Center for the Art of Performance at UCLA (CAP UCLA) has announced its 2023–24 season, including Gabriel Kahane & Attacca Quartet performing from his album Magnificent Bird in the new UCLA Nimoy Theater on October 22 and Kronos Quartet celebrating its fiftieth anniversary season in Royce Hall on April 28, as well as several other artists who can be hear on Nonesuch recordings.

Natalie Merchant performs two sold-out shows at Lincoln Center's Alice Tully Hall in NYC backed by The Knights orchestra. John Adams conducts The Death of Klinghoffer in Amsterdam, broadcast on NPO Klassiek. Laurie Anderson launches European tour at Primavera Sound in Barcelona. Julia Bullock joins Kansas City Symphony for Mahler and more. Yussef Dayes tours mid-Atlantic. Hurray for the Riff Raff performs at Natural History Museum in LA. Cécile McLorin Salvant is in Utrecht. Molly Tuttle & Golden Highway open for Dierks Bentley in Michigan and Ohio, then head to Kentucky.

Molly Tuttle and her band Golden Highway have released “Next Rodeo,” a new song from their upcoming album, City of Gold, due July 21. You can watch a video for the song filmed at Nashville’s Sound Emporium Studios, where it was recorded, here. In celebration of the new music, Molly Tuttle and Golden Highway: Live in Nashville—a special concert event filmed earlier this year—will air on PBS starting this Saturday, June 3. 

Multi-instrumentalist, producer, and composer Yussef Dayes has released a new single, “Rust,” featuring longstanding collaborator and friend Tom Misch, from his upcoming debut solo album, Black Classical Music, due September 8. You can hear it here. The track is the second single to be shared from the album, following the release of its title track, a collaboration with Charlie Stacey and Venna.

Congratulations to Rhiannon Giddens, who received an honorary Doctor of Music degree from Princeton University at the commencement ceremony this morning. "Named by NPR as one of the 25 Most Influential Women Musicians of the 21st Century, she has dedicated her career to raising up voices that have been overlooked or erased," says the school. "Few contemporary artists have done more to connect overlooked musical traditions of America’s past with music being performed today."

“Natalie Merchant is unique—her voice, her approach to her career—and her new album is unique in this moment,” Alison Stewart says of her guest on WNYC’s All of It. They discuss the album, Keep Your Courage, ahead of Merchant's concerts at Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall, joined by The Knights orchestra, this weekend, and at NJPAC in Newark with Orchestra of St. Luke’s on June 25. You can hear their conversation here.

Congratulations to k.d. lang, who received the 2023 Governor General’s Performing Arts Awards for Lifetime Artistic Achievement, Canada’s highest honor in the performing arts, from Governor General Mary Simon at Rideau Hall in Ottawa on Friday. The award recognizes artists for having made an indelible contribution to cultural life in Canada and around the world. The six 2023 laureates were honored again at the Awards Gala at the National Arts Centre last night. "I can’t even actually fathom being placed in the same company as the people, the artists who have influenced me so tremendously,” lang said. "Canada has such an embarrassment of riches, so many tremendous artists, and to be bestowed with this honor is unthinkable really ... So, thank you."

Rhiannon Giddens, Chris Thile, and Edgar Meyer are in Knoxville, TN, this Memorial Day weekend for Yo-Yo Ma’s Our Common Nature: An Appalachian Celebration. Thomas Adès leads Ballet Opéra de Paris in Dante. Sam Amidon celebrates Harry Smith’s centenary at Ancienne Belgique in Brussels. Richard Goode plays Beethoven in San Juan. k.d. lang gets Governor General’s Performing Arts Awards for Lifetime Artistic Achievement in Ottawa. Brad Mehldau concludes Netherlands Chamber Orchestra residency in Rotterdam. Jeff Parker performs in California. Cécile McLorin Salvant tours Spain. Molly Tuttle & Golden Highway are in Massachusetts, Virginia, and Maryland.