This Martin Luther King, Jr., weekend, Kronos Quartet, continuing its 40th anniversary celebration through the 2013–14 concert season, performs two nights at the Power Center in Ann Arbor, Michigan, tonight and on Saturday, as part of the University of Michigan’s Renegade Series. Tonight’s performance places an emphasis on historical renegades; on the program are works by Laurie Anderson, Krzysztof Penderecki, Wiley, Monk, and Wagner, along with Steve Reich’s WTC 9/11—recorded for Nonesuch Records in 2011—and John Oswald’s Spectre, both written for Kronos. The second half of the concert consists of George Crumb’s Black Angels, the piece that inspired Kronos founder David Harrington to form the group.

Saturday’s program takes a look at contemporary political events through the renegade lens, opening with the premiere of Suite from 'Dirty Wars,' with music from the film Dirty Wars, which features music performed by Kronos Quartet was just nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature. This multipart suite features works by David Harrington, who was music supervisor on the film, the Palestinian collective Ramallah Underground, a contemporary Iraqi folk song, and a traditional Lebanese song recorded on Kronos’s 2009 Nonesuch album, Floodplain. The Quartet goes on to perform another piece from Floodplain, Aleksandra Vrebalov’s …hold me, neighbor, in this storm…, Bob Dylan’s “Masters of War,” and two pieces by composers affiliated with the University of Michigan: professor Michael Daugherty’s Sing Sing: J. Edgar Hoover and the world premiere of alum David T. Little’s AGENCY.

Detroit Free Press, previewing this weekend's concerts, writes that so many of Kronos’s “achievements have been absorbed into the DNA of classical music, that it’s easy to overlook how revolutionary the group was … [Kronos] was there first, opening doors with a damn-the-rules mentality that inspired multiple generations of new music ensembles.”

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Bombino continues the Italian leg of his five-week European tour at Festival Fòcara in Novoli tonight, and at the Auditorium Flog in Florence on Saturday. Taking the songs of his recently released Nonesuch debut album, Nomad, on the road, he rounds out his tour of Italy in Trieste, Bologna, Colle di Val D’elsa, and Turin.

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Shawn Colvin, who closed out a three-night residency at Yoshi’s in San Francisco last night, rounds out the Californian leg of her solo tour at the Lobero Theatre in Santa Barbara tonight. She performs in Arizona and Florida before heading to the UK for Celtic Connections’ Transatlantic Sessions.

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Jeremy Denk concludes his three-night run with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra at Meyerhoff Symphony Hall in Baltimore tonight and on Saturday, performing Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 25. Also on the program are Haydn’s Symphony No. 30, “Alleluja,” Mozart’s Bassoon Concerto, and Beethoven’s Symphony No. 8.

Denk performs a sold-out solo recital, featuring works by Ligeti, Nancarrow, and Schumann, at the Howland Cultural Center in Beacon, New York, on Sunday.

The Boston Globe, reviewing Denk’s recent performance of Shumann’s Davidsbündlertänze at the Gardner Museum, says: “Denk (and Schumann) always have a surplus of technique waiting around every seemingly unplanned turn. But it makes manifest the paradox that invigorates the repertoire: that notes foreordained, familiar, fixed on the page for centuries, can still take one completely by surprise.” 

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Speaking of Davidsbündlertänze, pianist Richard Goode performs this same Schumann piece at Zellerbach Hall in Berkeley, California, on Sunday afternoon. Also on the eclectic program are selections from Janáček’s An Overgrown Path and the first dozen of Debussy’s Préludes (Book 1). Goode kicks off a European tour on February 6.

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Gidon Kremer and his Kremerata Baltica chamber orchestra, on a week-long tour of Spain, head to the Canary Islands off the coast to perform at the Auditorio Insular Infanta Cristina in Gomera as part of the Festival de Music de Canarias on Monday.

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Audra McDonald performs at two universities in California this weekend: a sold-out show at Stanford’s Bing Concert Hall in Stanford tonight, and Sonoma State’s Green Music Center in Rohnert Park on Saturday, where she is backed by musical director Andy Einhorn on piano, Mark Vanderpoel on bass, and Gene Lewin on drums. At both of these schools, McDonald performs selections from her latest Nonesuch album, Go Back Home, as well as other songs from the American songbook.

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Chris Thile, following a three-night stint at the Sydney Festival, performs at Mona Foma in Hobart on the island of Tasmania, Australia, tonight. He then heads back to the mainland for a final Australian show at Arts Centre Melbourne on Monday, before bringing the music of his new album, Bach: Sonatas and Partitas, Vol. 1, and more back to the US for the last leg of his solo tour in February. “Truly as comfortable playing roots, bluegrass or classical, Thile is a virtuoso with no discernible bounds,” writes the Huffington Post.

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Sara Watkins and her brother Sean perform a sold-out show at Largo at the Coronet in Los Angeles tonight, as part of their monthly musical residency, Watkins Family Hour. Tonight’s special guests include Sam Phillips, who released three albums on Nonesuch between 2001 and 2008, Dan Wilson, and Garrison Starr, among others.