k.d. lang and the Siss Boom Bang perform two sets at the Shoreline Amphitheatre in Mountain View, California, Saturday and Sunday as a part of the much-loved Bridge School Benefit Concert. The two-day, all-acoustic concert, organized by Neil Young and his wife Pegi, is an annual non-profit charity event with all proceeds going directly to The Bridge School, an organization dedicated to assisting individuals with severe speech and physical impairments through educational strategies. Among the performers at this year's concert are Neil Young and Crazy Horse, Jack White, The Flaming Lips, Ray LaMontagne, Lucidna Williams, Sarah McLachlan, and more. For more on The Bridge School and its efforts, go to bridgeschool.org.

And to watch the full weekend's music unfold live online, head to the Bridge School's Facebook page, where fans around the world can watch the concert stream live for a $5 donation.

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Laurie Anderson has brought her US tour to the West Coast, performing her latest piece, Dirtday!, at the University of Washington's Meany Hall in Seattle on Saturday. The sold-out performance follows an informal lecture about her career at UW's Kane Hall tonight and precedes a discussion with local artists Amy Wheeler and Sandra Dumont-Jackson at the Seattle Center's Intiman Playhouse Sunday at noon exploring the role of art in civic action.

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The Black Keys kick off their Australian tour with a show at the Newcastle Entertainment Centre in Broadmeadow, New South Wales, on Sunday. Opening for the band along the tour, which runs into November, are Sydney natives Royal Headache.

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Billy Bragg, having wowed crowds across New Zealand, takes his tour to Australia , starting with a concert at Hamer Hall in Melbourne tonight, featuring songs from the Mermaid Avenue albums, on which he and Wilco's Jeff Tweedy set Woody Guthrie's words to music. On Saturday, Bragg stops by Readings St. Kilda for a booked-out in-store performance and to sign CDs and his book The Progressive Patriot. Later that night, he's got a second show in Melbourne, at the Melbourne Recital Center, featuring songs from throughout his career. On the remainder of the tour, starting with Sunday's show at the Federation Concert Hall in Hobart, Bragg will play one set of Guthrie songs and one set of his own.

The tour celebrates the life and legacy of Woody Guthrie, on the centennial of the folk legend’s birth. Bragg, says the Syndey Morning Herald, can be credited for bringing the world a whole new dimension to the man referred to as the 'dust-bowl troubadour.'" The New Zealand Herald calls Bragg's show "an absolute hoot."

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Carolina Chocolate Drops bring their European tour to the Netherlands for two shows this weekend, with support from David Wax Museum, at People’s Place in Amsterdam tonight and Tivoli de Helling in Utrecht on Saturday. The Chocolate Drops will meet up with Nonesuch label mates Punch Brothers next week for three shows in Germany.

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Shawn Colvin and Mary Chapin Carpenter continue their UK tour with a set at the Usher Hall in Edinburgh tonight and the Philharmonic Hall in Liverpool on Saturday. These special shows feature the acclaimed songwriters (and longtime friends) performing as an intimate duo and will include material spanning their vast catalogs as well as some of their favorite songs.

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Dr. John continues his US Spirituals of Funk tour with the Blind Boys of Alabama with show at McCain Auditorium at Kansas State University tonight and the Bourbon Theatre in Lincoln, Nebraska, on Saturday. Dr. John and the Blind Boys head back to Kansas to play Yardley Hall at Johnson County Community College in Overland Park on Sunday. Based on the legendary Carnegie Hall Spirituals to Swing concerts of the 1930s, Spirituals to Funk explores the connections between jazz, blues, and gospel, all under Dr. John's musical direction.

The Las Vegas Review-Journal, reporting from Tuesday's show, says that Dr. John "left no doubt, decades on from being known as The Night Tripper, he can still stir up a mean musical stew."

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Emmylou Harris performs at the Spirit of Suwannee Music Park in Live Oak, Florida, tonight as part of the Magnolia Music Festival, joining such fellow performers as Bonnie Raitt, Del McCoury Band, and more. Harris's very special show at Nashville's Marathon Music Works next week—an exclusive performance of her album Wrecking Ball with Daniel Lanois and Jim Wilson to benefit Crossroads Campus—is her last scheduled US date before the launch of her Australia and New Zealand tour in November.

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Gidon Kremer and his Kremerata Baltica chamber orchestra continue their three-week tour of Asia with two performances in South Korea this weekend: at the Goyang Aram Nuri Arts Center in Goyang tonight and the Daejeon Arts Center in Daejeon on Sunday. In the weeks ahead, Kremer and the orchestra head to China and Japan.

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Kronos Quartet launches its European tour with a performance at Taetro Sociale in Bergamo, Italy, as a part of the Bergamo Scienza festival, an annual event organized by BergamoScienza, a non-profit group dedicated to popularizing science. The program features a performance of Steve Reich's WTC 9/11 along with works by Bryce Dessner, Terry Riley, Michael Gordon, and more.

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Lianne La Havas closes out the UK leg of her tour with shows at the Leadmill in Sheffield on Saturday, the O2 Academy in Bristol on Sunday, and the O2 Academy in Oxford on Monday. La Havas returns to the United States next month for shows at the Birchmere in Alexandria, the Roxy Theatre in LA, and the Rickshaw Stop in San Francisco.

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Jessica Lea Mayfield plays the Duling Green Space in Jackson, Mississippi, on Saturday afternoon as a part of Guactoberfest with Todd Snider, Amanda Shires, Grayson Capps, Wild Feathers, and Otis Lotus.

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Natalie Merchant joins the Espous Chamber Orchestra, led by by Nadège Foofat, to perform her works for voice and chamber orchestra including a world première of Andalucia, at the Quimby Theatre at SUNY Ulster in Stone Ridge, New York, on Saturday.

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Punch Brothers finish up the latest leg of their US tour with an appearance at the Shoals Community Theatre in Florence, Alabama, tonight. The band's show in Cologne, Germany, on Monday marks the first of three shows in the country with fellow Nonesuch artists Carolina Chocolate Drops and the beginning of Punch Brothers' European tour.

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Sara Watkins continues her US tour as a special guest of Jackson Browne with shows at Music Center for Performing Arts in Detroit on Saturday and the Riverside Theatre in Milwaukee on Sunday. Browne can be heard contributing guest vocals on Watkins' latest album, Sun Midnight Sun. They continue their tour together with a series of US performances throughout November.