There's much in store this Canada Day and for the July 4th weekend ahead ...

Chris Thile, following last night's performance with Punch Brothers in Brooklyn's beautiful Prospect Park, joins fellow Nickel Creek alum Sara Watkins as special guests on A Prairie Home Companion with Garrison Keillor, broadcasting live from Koussevitzky Music Shed at similarly beautiful Tanglewood in Lenox, Massachusetts, Saturday afternoon. This is the final live broadcast performance of the show this season and marks the 12th annual Tanglewood visit for the show. Also appearing on this weekend's season finale are Broadway actress Christine DiGiallonardo and Gospel singing sisters Jearlyn and Jevetta Steele.

A Prairie Home Companion is broadcast on NPR member stations across the United States and airs on Sirius Satellite Radio, Saturday at 5 PM CST. The show also streams live online at that time at prairiehome.org, with a rebroadcast Sunday at 11 AM CST.

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The Cincinnati Opera follows last night's performance of John Adams's opera A Flowering Tree with an encore performance on Saturday, reuniting the world-premiere cast featured on the Nonesuch recording of the opera: soprano Jessica Rivera, tenor Russell Thomas, and bass-baritone Eric Owens. The Cincinnati Enquirer says "Adams takes a striking new path" with A Flowering Tree, "combining an exotic story of magical transformation and love with ravishing music ... lyrical, lush and dreamlike."

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As noted earlier this week in the Nonesuch Journal, Björk premiered her Biophilia live show yesterday at Campfield Market Hall in Manchester, England, as a part of the Manchester International Festival, marking Björk's first UK performance in three years. She continues her fully sold-out three-week festival residency this weekend with another intimate set Sunday afternoon. The performances follow the release of the forthcoming Biophilia album’s lead single “Crystalline” earlier this week. Pitchfork calls it "a wonderfully confounding teaser for Biophilia, leaving the possible worlds it explores wide open to suggestion."

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The Black Keys kicked off their trans-Canadian summer tour on Monday, which continues with a show at the MTS Centre in Winnipeg Saturday night. The band has a three-show run in the States before returning to Great White North, starting with Sunday's sold-out show at the Roy Wilkins Auditorium in Saint Paul, Minnesota. Cage the Elephant opens each night.

The Star Phoenix, reviewing last night's show in Saskatoon, reports: "For the sold-out crowd at TCU Place Thursday night, The Black Keys’ pitch-perfect performance allowed the audience to experience a proper rock show ... The group proves easygoing rock sans glitz, glamour and gimmicks is all that’s needed to entertain."

The Edmonton Sun gave Wednesday's show at Rexall Place four stars. The Edmonton Journal says Dan Auerbach's "raspy vocals and thick stabs of guitar fuzz wafted through the arena like an intoxicating cologne."

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Carolina Chocolate Drops perform a free set at RiverScape MetroPark in Dayton, Ohio, tonight. The performance is part of the Cityfolk Festival, a three day multi-cultural celebration, featuring traditional and ethnic music and arts from throughout the world.

The band performed a set at the inaugural Dave Matthews Band Caravan festival last weekend in Atlantic City, which Atlantic City Weekly considers one of the weekend’s best: “The crowd went absolutely crazy for the Carolina Chocolate Drops, proving that the band’s old-time sound is as hot as it’s been in a long time.”

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Wanda Jackson performs at Club Soda in Montreal on Saturday as part of the Montreal International Jazz Festival. Jackson spoke with the Montreal Mirror's Johnson Cummins about her storied career in rock 'n' roll and her recently released Third Man / Nonesuch Records debut, The Party Ain't Over.

"Listening to Wanda Jackson’s Southern drawl over the phone as she gives me a firsthand account of the formative days of rock ’n’ roll has all of my goosebumps standing at attention," writes Cummins. "Jack­son is true blue rock ’n’ roll royalty ... Proving that the 73-year-old Mrs. Jackson’s bellow and croon have hardly weathered with age is one of her finest moments yet, the recently released The Party Ain’t Over, produced by longtime fan Jack White."

Jackson's recent performance on Mountain Stage, which premiered last weekend on NPR and featured several songs from The Party Ain't Over, is now available online at npr.org.

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k.d. lang and the Siss Boom Bang continue their North American tour with three performances this holiday weekend. The Canadian-born singer celebrates Canada Day (and the one-year anniversary of the new band) tonight with a concert at Hill Auditorium in Ann Arbor, Michigan, for the Ann Arbor Summer Festival; followed by a performance at The Belleayre Conservatory in Highmount, New York, on Sunday; and, closing out the long weekend, at Binghamton University’s Anderson Center for the Arts in Binghamton, New York, for Fourth of July on Monday. The Belle Brigade opens each show.

The Grand Rapids Press, reviewing last night's sold-out concert at Meijer Gardens, says the audience "couldn’t get enough of the Canadian songstress, her miles-long vocal range and the lovely, offbeat jumble of steel guitar, Hammond organ, accordion and other assorted musical toys played by herself and her band." Reviewer Lorilee Craker explains: "The lady has a voice in a million, a rich, full-bodied instrument that cradles notes with impeccable control and astonishing range. Her peerless style is a rootsy and wholly original union of alt country, jazz and New Wave."

The Montreal Gazette's Bernard Perusse, reviewing lang and the band's recent performance at Montreal's Place des Arts, notes lang's "ever-mighty and supple voice," and describes her latest Nonesuch release, Sing it Loud, as "one of the best of her career." Perusse calls lang "a force of nature ... Presiding over a first-rate night of real torch and twang."

Reviewing the recent set at the Ottawa International Jazz Fest, the Ottawa Citizen’s Lynn Saxberg recalls: "Every time k.d. lang tilted her head back and sent her voice soaring skywards, a hush fell over the crowd ... We held our breath and time stood still as the Canadian songstress demonstrated her power."

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Jessica Lea Mayfield kicked off her US summer tour in Chicago earlier this week, with more stops in the Midwest to come this weekend. She takes the stage at the Varsity Theater in Minneapolis tonight, before heading to Iowa for shows Saturday and Sunday nights: at Western Gateway Park in Des Moines on Saturday, as a part of the 80/35 Music Festival, and at Gabel’s in Iowa City on Sunday. Mayfield is joined by Ferraby Lionheart tonight and Sunday, with The Poison Control Center joining in Iowa City as well.