Chris Thile's new solo album, Bach: Sonatas and Partitas, Vol. 1, was released to critical acclaim earlier this year. The album comprises three works written for solo violin, including Sonata No. 1 in G minor, BWV 1001, which Thile performs in its entirety for a new video, available here. He is in the midst of a solo tour of North America, performing music from the new album and more.

Jeremy Denk performs Bach’s Goldberg Variations at The Kennedy Center and Chicago Symphony Center ... Alarm Will Sound kicks off Metropolitan Museum of Art residency ... Sam Amidon rounds out US tour in LA ... Shawn Colvin, Mary Chapin Carpenter tour the US ... Emmylou Harris, Rodney Crowell take tour to Texas ... Gidon Kremer is in Germany ... Kronos Quartet is in Wisconsin ... Audra McDonald sings a Chicago Symphony Center ... Orquesta Buena Vista Social Club closes out US tour in NYC ... Joshua Redman tours Netherlands ... Chris Thile is in the South ... Rokia Traoré plays Paris ... and more ...

Alarm Will Sound begins two important components of its 2013–14 concert season this week: its second "St. Louis season" and its season-long residency at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. The latter comprises four concerts, starting this Friday and including the New York premiere of Steve Reich's new piece, Radio Rewrite, on an all-Reich program November 16.

Gidon Kremer organized a concert at Berlin's Philharmonic Hall on Monday, titled To Russia with Love, to honor slain Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya and support human rights in Russia. Performers included Kremer and Kremerata Baltica, Martha Argerich, Daniel Barenboim, Emanuel Pahud, and others, in a program of works Shostakovich, Prokofiev, Tchaikovsky; the premiere of a new piece by Giya Kancheli; and more. You can watch the complete concert here, via Arte Live Web.

Jeremy Denk has written a brief personal history for this week's issue of The New Yorker, the Money Issue. In the piece, his third for the magazine, Denk shares a story from early in his career. He is also featured on the latest edition of The New Yorker's Out Loud podcast, discussing his new recording of Bach's Goldberg Variations. The album includes video "liner notes," about which Tom Moon writes in Medium: "After hearing him speak with such precision about the details of the work, it’s an absolute delight to hear him use so much of his personality—his poise and exacting sense of order, his restraint leavened by a childlike peering-around-corners curiosity—to bring Bach to life."

Audra McDonald and Mandy Patinkin were special guests on The Colbert Report, as the show threw what it humbly dubbed the "Wedding of the Century." Host Stephen Colbert officiated an on-air wedding ceremony for a couple whose wedding plans were thwarted by the US government shutdown. To help celebrate the newlyweds, Patinkin offered a non-denominational Jewish blessing and McDonald sang Billy Idol's "White Wedding" for the couple's first dance. Watch it here. Audra McDonald was due to perform at the Library of Congress in Washington, DC, this week, but the concert was canceled due to the government shutdown and will be rescheduled.

Rufus Wainwright offered a short performance at a screening of Sing Me the Songs That Say I Love You, the film documenting a 2011 NYC tribute concert for his mother, the late Kate McGarrigle, at the Hammer Museum in LA last month. The 22-minute set included two Kate McGarrigle songs—"The Work Song" and "(Talk to Me of) Mendocino"—and more. Watch the complete set here. Nonesuch Records released Sing Me the Songs: Celebrating the Works of Kate McGarrigle, a two-CD set of songs from the concert in the film and two others held in honor of the late singer-songwriter.

St. Louis Symphony performs John Adams’s new Saxophone Concerto ... Shawn Colvin, Mary Chapin Carpenter resume duo tour in Midwest ... Jeremy Denk gives solo recitals in upstates New York ... Richard Goode is in Copenhagen ... Emmylou Harris returns to Hardly Strictly Bluegrass with Rodney Crowell and in Kate McGarrigle tribute ... Gidon Kremer, Kremerata Baltica perform in Germany ... k.d. lang sings at LA's Hammer Museum gala ... Audra McDonald sings in Queens ... Brad Mehldau, Orpheus Chamber Orchestra give US premiere of new Mehldau piece ... Natalie Merchant joins New Jersey Symphony Chamber Orchestra ... Orquesta Buena Vista Social Club is in Atlanta ... Joshua Redman tours Europe ... Chris Thile performs solo out West ... Rokia Traoré brings Beautiful Africa to Réunion ... Sara Watkins plays in Southern California ... and more ...

Brad Mehldau joins the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra for the US premiere of his Variations on a Melancholy Theme, which he says sounds “as if Brahms woke up one day and had the blues." Also on the program are works by Brahms and Beethoven. The three-city tour includes stops in Massachusetts and Pennsylvania, and the New York premiere at Carnegie Hall. Mehldau then kicks off a ten-day US tour of Mehliana, a new electric duo with drummer Mark Guiliana, and heads to Europe for a week of solo shows before a two-week Mehliana tour of Europe and the UK.

Mandolin virtuoso Chris Thile—who, with his fellow Punch Brothers, performed at the unforgettable benefit concert Another Day, Another Time: Celebrating the Music of “Inside Llewyn Davis,” inspired by music from the upcoming Coen Brothers’ film, Inside Llewyn Davis, in New York City on Sunday—kicks off a solo tour performing music from his new album, Bach: Sonatas and Partitas, Vol. 1, at Meany Hall for the Performing Arts in Seattle tonight. The tour makes its way across the US West, down South, and into the Midwest before heading to the Northeast for stops including a sold-out New York City show in Carnegie Hall's Zankel Hall. Thile heads to Europe in November. 

Today marks the North American release of pianist—and newly minted MacArthur Fellow—Jeremy Denk’s recording of J.S. Bach’s Goldberg Variations, with the international release to follow on October 21. A companion DVD accompanies the album and contains video “liner notes,” with Denk demonstrating passages on the piano as he explains certain details of the iconic piece. Denk is currently touring the US and will perform the piece in Washington, DC, and Chicago later this month.

The one-night only benefit concert inspired by music from the upcoming Coen Brothers’ film, Inside Llewyn Davis, takes place at The Town Hall in New York City Sunday; Showtime will air the concert December 13 ... Sam Amidon tours Northeast with Josh Ritter ... Laurie Anderson exhibition opens in Austin ... Orquesta Buena Vista Social Club tour Midwest ... Jeremy Denk joins Colorado University Symphony in Boulder ... Emmylou Harris, Rodney Crowell kick off California leg of US tour ... Iron and Wine hits Chicago and Toronto ... Gidon Kremer, Kremerata Baltica join Slava's Snow Show in Russia ... Audra McDonald opens Koerner Hall season in Toronto ... Punch Brothers play Wide Open Bluegrass in Raleigh ... Joshua Redman is in Iowa ... Rokia Traoré plays the Düsseldorf fest ... and more ...