Following the release of their critically acclaimed new album El Camino and a sold-out European tour earlier this year, The Black Keys have announced new European dates in November and December 2012. The tour includes concerts in Portugal, Spain, France, Italy, Holland, and Germany. Tickets go on sale on Wednesday. As the NME wrote of the band’s recent UK tour, "The Black Keys have slowly but surely become one of the biggest bands in the world—and going by this wonderfully charged performance, it’s not difficult to understand why."

Dr. John launches his three-week residency at BAM with a Louis Armstrong tribute, then heads home to New Orleans for a free show in the NCAA Big Dance Concert Series Sunday; The Black Keys play Saturday ... Alarm Will Sound performs John Adams's Son of Chamber Symphony in Michigan ... Björk headlines Lollapalooza Chile ... Carolina Chocolate Drops launch West Coast tour in Portland and Seattle ... Shawn Colvin plays outside DC ... Jeremy Denk joins San Francisco Symphony for American Mavericks at Carnegie Hall ... Dawn Upshaw gives a recital in San Francisco ... and more ...

Dr. John, who launched his three-week residency at the Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM) last night, is the subject of a feature article in the New York Times that looks at his career and the unexpected turn it takes on his new album, Locked Down, produced by Dan Auerbach. They are featured in the Wall Street Journal, which says the "incendiary new album ... both harks back to [Dr. John]'s past and breaks new musical ground." Locked Down earns four stars from the Independent and the Times of London, which says Auerbach "has brought out the best in a true American original." The Guardian gives a perfect five stars to this "inspired" album: "[N]o one makes music like this: the Night Tripper rampages inimitably through swamp blues, voodoo funk and Afrobeat, with his trademark piano ... Terrific stuff."

Dr. John can be heard across the BBC this week, on the BBC Radio 4's Front Row and the BBC World Service's The Strand; his new album, Locked Down, is the BBC 6 Music Album of the Day. It's Album of the Month in Uncut, earning a nine out of ten. "Hugely successful," the magazine exclaims. "Weird, powerful rock ‘n’ roll ... enormously funky." Rolling Stone, MOJO, and the NY Daily News all give Locked Down four stars: "Full of muscled, vintage R&B grooves, fevered soloing, psychedelic arrangements and oracular mumbo jumbo," says Rolling Stone, "it's the wildest record he's made in many years." The Daily News calls it "one of the smokiest, funkiest, sexiest works of the legend’s career." MOJO says: "Dr. John teams up with Dan Auerbach and the gumbo is bubbling once again ... This is definitely right place, right time."

Timothy Andres will make his London debut at Wigmore Hall on Friday, June 8, with a concert that marks the opening of the venue’s latest summer Late Night Series. The solo recital will focus on Andres’s own music and that of his contemporaries, as well as some of his major influences, like Brahms and Schumann. Before then, Andres has a number of US performances ahead, including a concert with the Brad Mehldau Trio in Denver.

With March Madness heading into the final stretch, Dr. John will play a free set in New Orleans' Woldenberg Park this Sunday as part of the NCAA Big Dance Concert Series. Dan Auerbach, the producer of his new album, Locked Down, plays on Saturday with The Black Keys. Both Dr. John and Auerbach will premiere music from the album at BAM the following weekend as part of Dr. John's three-week BAM residency, which begins tomorrow. Dr. John will be featured on BBC Radio 4's Front Row tonight.

Sun Midnight Sun, the second solo album from acclaimed singer, songwriter, and fiddle player Sara Watkins, will be released May 8 on Nonesuch Records. Produced by guitarist, singer, and songwriter Blake Mills, co-founder of the band Simon Dawes, the album features special guest appearances by Fiona Apple, Jackson Browne, Taylor Goldsmith (Dawes), Benmont Tench, and Sean Watkins. The album is available to pre-order on in the Nonesuch Store with an exclusive print signed by Watkins. In celebration of the album's release, Watkins will embark on a nationwide tour this spring and summer, including a series of special tour dates with Dawes.

Chris Thile joined the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra for the New York premiere of his Mandolin Concerto at Carnegie Hall on Saturday. The New York Times wonders if the mandolin is "about to have its moment as a classical solo instrument" and calls Thile "the instrument’s brightest star at the moment." Thile "knows how to surprise," says the Times' Allan Kozinn. "As fresh as the music sounded, it also had an appealing naturalness." The mandolin's solo line "is built on Mr. Thile’s more subtle brand of virtuosity—a blend of fluid melody, dazzling speed and a command of timbre ..."

Timothy Andres's music was featured on a number of concert programs in Los Angeles this weekend, including a piece from his debut album, Shy and Mighty, at Beyond Baroque, and Andres himself joining the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra on piano for the world premiere of his Old Keys and the West Coast premiere of his re-composition of Mozart's "Coronation" Concerto. "What is most original about Andres’ music so far is its extraordinary pianistic character," says the Los Angeles Times review. "He is a superb pianist with a highly evolved rhythmic sense and a quirky sense of humor."

Mac Rebennack, a.k.a Dr. John, whose new album, Locked Down, is due out next week, was the guest on today's episode of WNYC's Soundcheck. He performs a live solo piano version of "Big Shot," a song off the new album, and talks about working with producer Dan Auerbach on the album. He also gives preview of his three-week residency at the Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM), which launches this week with a tribute to Louis Armstrong, followed by the premiere of new music from Locked Down with Auerbach (April 5–7), and a celebration of New Orleans music (April 12–15). Listen to the show here.

Nonesuch releases the label debut from acclaimed pianist Jeremy Denk, Ligeti/Beethoven, on May 15, 2012. The solo recording features Ligeti’s Piano Études, Books One and Two, and Beethoven’s Sonata No. 32 in C Minor. "One curious connection between the works on this album is the way both Ligeti and Beethoven relate themselves to jazz (and to syncopation, rhythmic dislocation generally)," says Denk. "But the most significant connection for me is between Beethoven’s vast timeless canvas and Ligeti’s bite-sized bits of infinity." Pre-order now. Tune in to Q2 Music all this week to hear Denk guest host Hammered!, and again tonight for a live videocast performance/conversation with Denk, John Adams, Michael Tilson Thomas, and the St. Lawrence String Quartet.

In 2004, Caetano Veloso curated a week of special concerts at Carnegie Hall and invited his longtime friend and collaborator David Byrne to join him for the show captured on the new album Caetano Veloso & David Byrne: Live at Carnegie Hall. "Respected songwriters who for the last four decades have in similar ways chronicled their respective cultures, the pair trade stripped-down renditions of some of their classics on this live document and in doing so offer borderless bliss," says the Los Angeles Times. Citing Veloso's take on Byrne's "(Nothing but) Flowers," the Times concludes: "Such joy is evident throughout Live at Carnegie Hall.” MOJO gives the album four stars.