This long Labor Day weekend, The Low Anthem hits the fourth and final installment of the Dave Matthews Band Caravan, in Washington state. The three-day festival takes place on the grounds of The Gorge, about halfway between Seattle and Spokane in George, Washington. Head to Plaza Stage at 4:30 PM on Sunday to see The Low Anthem perform. Also performing at the Caravan this weekend are The Roots, De La Soul, Gogol Bordello, The Belle Brigade, Josh Ritter, and, of course, the Dave Matthews Band. Earlier stops on the Caravan this summer included sets from Low Anthem label mates Emmylou Harris, Carolina Chocolate Drops, Punch Brothers, and Ben Folds.

"Every once in a while you go to a show with high expectations and they are redeemed, even exceeded," says the Kansas City Star's Timothy Finn, reviewing The Low Anthem's show at RecordBar in Kansas City earlier this week. "It was rewarding to be in a room with people who genuinely appreciated music and a band that deserved all the attention and appreciation it received."

The band's latest Nonesuch release, Smart Flesh, is included in this week's Play>Skip feature in The Huffington Post from contributor Shawn Amos, who praises it as "beautifully naked music." Also on the list is fellow Nonesuch artist k.d. lang, whose new album with the Siss Boom Bang, Sing it Loud, has made "a believer again" of Amos, who explains: "This album grooves, swings, and rocks without a net or a note of self-consciousness."

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Carolina Chocolate Drops return to their home state to perform at the inaugural Triad Music Fest at NewBridge Bank Park in Greensboro, North Carolina, on Saturday.

Reviewing their set at Colorado's Rocky Mountain Folk Festival, Yellow Scene magazine's Tyra Sutak calls the Drops a "crowd favorite," saying the band "brought the crowd to their unadorned feet with the energetic sounds of a combination of strings, vocals and beat boxing."

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As announced earlier today in the Nonesuch Journal, Wanda Jackson, after completing her wildly successful round of tour dates with British phenom Adele, embarks on a new set of solo tour dates, the first of which is a headlining set at the Muddy Roots Festival in Cookeville, Tennessee, on Sunday.

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Jessica Lea Mayfield continues her US summer tour with a Sunday set at the Seattle Center in Seattle, Washington as a part of the 41st annual Bumbershoot Music & Arts Festival, a showcase for music, film, comedy, spoken word, dance, theatre, performance, and visual arts.

Mayfield is calling on fans to animate her new music video for "Blue Skies Again," a song off her Nonesuch debut album, Tell Me. The search for the official "Blue Skies Again" animated music video runs through September 14. Mayfield's favorite will take home a $500 cash prize, an autographed copy of Tell Me on vinyl and CD, a t-shirt, concert tickets, and backstage passes. For more information and to enter, visit her Facebook page here.

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The Gershwins' Porgy and Bess, starring Audra McDonald as Bess, opened at the American Repertory Theater in Cambridge, Massachusetts, this week and continues through September. "Ms. McDonald is Bess (or to use the hyperbolic speech of movie ads, 'Audra McDonald Is Bess')," exclaims New York Times theater critic Ben Brantley, "and she can claim rights to full possession of her role, the kind of ownership that transforms a classic character forever ... Ms. McDonald’s performance is as complete and complex a work of musical portraiture as any I’ve seen in years." The Boston Globe says that "in Audra McDonald, this production boasts a Bess for the ages."

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Punch Brothers have a busy weekend ahead with three performances in the Southwest: at the Mishawaka Amphitheatre in Bellevue, Colorado, tonight; Reservoir Hill Park in Pagosa Springs, Colorado, on Saturday as a part of the Four Corners Folk Festival; and the Moab Music Festival in Moab, Utah, on Sunday.

David Burger of the Salt Lake Tribune mentions the Punch Brothers as one of highlights of the upcoming Moab Music Festival, as a band that will "punch it up a notch." Says Burger: "Their inventive mash-up of bluegrass, rock, and classical is irresistible and they've have been wowing audiences across the globe."

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As noted earlier today in the Nonesuch Journal, the 38th Telluride Film Festival gets under way today and runs through Monday, with Caetano Veloso as its Guest Director. Tom Luddy, Co-Founder of the Festival, says: "Caetano Veloso will be presenting six films, both rare and established classics, with his unique enthusiasm about why they are movies worth seeing again or for the first time." In addition, the festival's program includes 25 new feature films plus special artist tributes, classics and restorations, shorts, student films, seminars and conversations, each introduced or proceeded with a Q&A by its filmmaker, actors, writer, or producer. Read more in the Nonesuch Journal article.

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Sara Watkins embarked on a new touring venture with Garrison Keillor and the cast of public radio's A Prairie Home Companion last weekend for their Summer Love Tour. The tour continues this weekend with a stop at the Minnesota State Fair in Falcon Heights, Minnesota, tonight.

In a recent interview with the Dallas-Ft. Worth Star Telegram, Keillor, excited for the new tour with Watkins, says: "She has a clear-as-a-bell, old-timey singing voice that has a lot of soul. You either have that sort of thing or you don't ... We'll sing 'Unchained Melody' and some other great, passionate duets, and I will try to avoid making eye contact with her so I don't become distracted."