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Nonesuch Events This Weekend

Here is our weekly list of just some of the many events going on across the globe this weekend featuring Nonesuch artists:

John Adams's opera A Flowering Tree received its Midwest premiere in Chicago's Millennium Park on Wednesday, with the composer conducting. The Chicago Opera Theater continues its production on Saturday with Adams conducting again. Tickets: chicagooperatheater.org.

On Sunday, at The Kennedy Center Concert Hall in Washington, DC, The Choral Arts Society of Washington, under the direction of Norman Scribner, will perform Adams's oratorio El Niño, which received its world premiere at the Châtelet in Paris in 2000, directed by Peter Sellars with soloists Dawn Upshaw, Lorraine Hunt-Lieberson, Willard White, who recorded the piece for its Nonesuch release. Tickets: kennedy-center.org.

Also on Sunday, the San Fransisco Symphony Youth Orchestra, led by Benjamin Schwartz, will perform Adams's 1995 piece Lollapalooza at Davies Symphony Hall in San Francisco, along with Stravinsky's Le Chant du rossignol and Dvořák's "New World" Symphony (sfsymphony.org); and the American Philharmonic Sonoma County, led by Gabriel Sakakeeny, will perform Short Ride in a Fast Machine at the Wells Fargo Center for the Arts in Santa Rosa, California (wellsfargocenterarts.org).

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Laurie Anderson will bring her latest performance piece, Homeland, to Spain this weekend: at Auditorio de Garcia in Santiago de Compostela in the country's northwest tonight and Auditorio de Murcia, in Murcia in the southeast on Sunday night.

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After a couple of days in New York that included stops at Late Night with Conan O'Brien and WNYC's Soundcheck and a sold-out show at Terminal 5, The Black Keys are moving on to Philadelphia for a sold-out set at the Electric Factory tonight, then to Boston for a show at the Orpheum Theatre Saturday night. Its the last gig on this leg of the US tour before they head to Europe. Tickets: boston-theater.com.

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The European leg of the Raising Sands tour continues, with T Bone Burnett joining Robert Plant and Alison Krauss on stage in Stockholm, Sweden, tonight at the Stockholm Hovet (globearenas.se), and Oslo, Norway, on Sunday at the Oslo Spektrum (oslospektrum.no).

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Richard Goode joins the Orchestra Philharmonique de Radio France, with Peter Oundjian conducting, tonight at Salle Pleyel in Paris for a program of works by Jacques Hétu, Mozart, and Brahms. Tickets: sallepleyel.fr.

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Kronos Quartet is in Europe this month, performing tonight at the Internationales Congress Center as part of the Dresden International Music Festival in Dresden, Germany. The Quartet performs Terry Riley's 2002 piece Sun Rings, which was commissioned for the group by the NASA Art Program among many others. Tickets: musikfestspiel.com.

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Nicholas Payton began a four-night residency at Dimitriou's Jazz Alley in Seattle, Washington, as the special guest of vibes master Bobby Hutcherson. For this presentation of KPLU 88.5 NPR and the Pacific Jazz Institute, Payton and Hutcherson are joined by Joe Gilman on piano, Glen Richman on bass, and Eddie Marshall on drums. Remaining performances this weekend include two sets each tonight and tomorrow night, plus a 7:30 set on Sunday. Tickets: jazzalley.com.

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Punch Brothers are back in full swing with the next leg of their US tour. They'll be at the the Satellite Ballroom in Charlottesville, Virginia, tonight (satelliteballroom.com); the Rams Head On Stage in Annapolis, Maryland, for two all-ages sets on Saturday, at 1 PM and 4 PM (tickets.ramsheadonstage.com); and the Mountain Stage Little Theatre in Charleston, West Virginia, on Sunday (mountainstage.org).

You can check out a recording of the band in concert on Live from Folk Alley now on folkalley.com. There's both video and streaming audio, as well as downloadable audio for members of the site, from a performance at The Kent Stage in Kent, Ohio, on April 2.

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Laura Veirs's solo tour continues with three stops this weekend: tonight at The 9:30 Listening Room in Louisville, Kentucky (the930.org); Saturday at The Basement in Nashville (thebasementnashville.com); and Sunday at The Earl in Atlanta (badearl.com); all with opener Liam Finn.

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Wilco two sold-out shows at The Pageant in St. Louis, Missouri, with opener Retribution Gospel Choir, featuring Alan Sparhawk of Low (thepageant.com). It's their last scheduled tour date before they ramp things up again for two shows in Alaska at the end of July with The Whipsaws.

Nonesuch Events This Weekend

Below is information on just some of the many events going on this weekend across the globe featuring Nonesuch artists. Enjoy!

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Violinist Leila Josefowicz will join the Saint Louis Symphony, led by conductor Marin Alsop, for three performances of John Adams's The Dharma at Big Sur this weekend at Powell Hall in St. Louis. Also tonight, the Bilbao Symphony Orchestra led by Raymond Leppard will perform Adams's Violin Concerto at the Euskalduna Palace in Bilbao, Spain, featuring violinist Chlöe Hanslip, and the Orchestra Sinfonica Nazionale RAI led by Trevor Pinnock will perform the composer's 1990 orchestration of Liszt's The Black Gondola, in Turin, Italy.

Saturday night, the San Francisco Ballet presents the Mark Morris Dance Group's Joyride, featuring Adams's Son of Chamber Symphony, at the War Memorial Opera House in San Francisco, as part of the continuing New Works Festival.

Adams's Short Ride in a Fast Machine gets three playings this weekend: Saturday night at the Saenger Theater in Mobile, Alabama, by Scott Speck and the Mobile Symphony, and Bloomington High School in Bloomington, Indiana, by Jose Valencia and the Musical Arts Youth Orchestra; and Sunday night at Royal Albert Hall, London, by Mark Gooding and the Harrow Young Musicians Philharmonic.

More information: boosey.com.

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Kronos Quartet plays the last of three performances at the Mondavi Center at the University of California, Davis, tonight: John Cage's Thirty Pieces for String Quartet with the Merce Cunningham Dance Company. Tickets: mondaviarts.org.

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Laurie Anderson will bring Homeland to the Moscow International Performing Arts Center in Russia on Saturday. On Sunday night, Laurie will join the weekend-long Symposium on Sound, a gathering of scientists, performers, and artists, at Leiden University in the Netherlands, for a discussion of the event's theme of mutual influence between art and science, especially as it relates to sound. Info: veenfabriek.nl.

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T Bone Burnett continues his tour with Robert Plant and Alison Krauss at New Orleans' famed Jazz & Heritage Festival, aka Jazz Fest. The three are scheduled to take the Acura Stage this afternoon at 3:30 PM. Next, they'll head to Birmingham, Alabama, where they'll play the BJCC Arena Saturday night. Tickets: nojazzfest.com (4/25); bjcc.org (4/26).

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Bill Frisell closes out his two week residency at New York's Village Vanguard with performances all weekend. Playing with Bill are Chris Cheek on sax, Ron Miles on trumpet, Tony Scherr on bass, and Rudy Royston on drums. Tickets: villagevanguard.com.

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Satyagraha, Philip Glass's 1980 opera centered around Mahatma Gandhi's early years in South Africa, continues tonight at the Metropolitan Opera in New York. The performance is sold out. More information: metoperafamily.org.

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Richard Goode will perform a free concert in New York City as part of the annual Free for All at Town Hall concert series. See the post in today's Nonesuch Journal for more information.

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Emmylou Harris takes the stage at the Tennessee Performing Arts Center in downtown Nashville tonight for Premiere Evening, an annual fund-raising event to benefit the Center's educational and cultural programming. Tickets: tpac.org.

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k.d. lang's continues the Australian leg of her Watershed tour at the Entertainment Center in Adelaide Saturday night. Tickets: theaec.net.

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Brad Mehldau is in Quebec, Canada, tonight for a solo show at the Palais Montcalm. He returns to the States on Saturday for a performance with the trio with whom he recorded the new album Live at the Hopkins Center at Dartmouth College in Hanover, NH, and a Sunday night show at the Annenberg Center's Zellerbach Theater in Philadelphia. Tickets: palaismontcalm.ca (4/25); hop.dartmouth.edu (4/26); pennpresents.org (4/27).

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Youssou N'Dour will perform a special benefit concert tonight at New York's intimate venue Joe's Pub as part of a fund-raising effort for the Youssou N'Dour Foundation and his worldwide advocacy efforts. The acoustic set will be modeled on the smaller sets he leads at his club in Dakar. Tickets: joespub.com.

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Randy Newman will play a solo date tonight at the Riley Center at Mississippi State University's Meridian Campus. Tickets: msurileycenter.com.

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Nicholas Payton stays close to home for New Orleans' Jazz Fest. He and his quintet will take the stage in the WWOZ Jazz Tent at 4:05 PM on Sunday. Among the other performers at this year's festival are Stevie Wonder and Al Green, as well as Robert Plant and Alison Krauss with T Bone Burnett (see above). Tickets: nojazzfest.com.

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Steve Reich's Eight Lines will be performed by Ensemble Intercontemporain led by Ludovic Morlot tonight at Cité de la musique, Salle des concerts, in Paris.

Reich's Desert Music, will presented at the University of California, Berkeley, Saturday, as Drumming will be performed by percussionist Colin Currie at the Concert Hall in Perth, Scotland. Currie earned four stars in the Herald (UK) for his performance there earlier this week of Reich's Music for Pieces of Wood that "mesmerised." Also Saturday, the Smith Quartet brings the Triple Quartet to the Jacqueline du Pre Music Building in Oxford, England.

On Sunday, Reich's Cello Counterpoint will be performed at the Purcell Room in London by Endymion and his Vermont Counterpoint can be heard at Ford Hall at Ithaca College, with Melissa Wertheimer on flute.

More information: boosey.com

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The national tour of Stephen Sondheim's Sweeney Todd, based on the 2005 Broadway production helmed by John Doyle, began its run at Chicago's Cadillac Palace Theatre early this week. Performances continue there through May 4. Tickets: sweeneytoddtour.com

Richard Goode to Perform Free Concert at NYC's Town Hall This Sunday

Richard Goode will be at New York City's Town Hall this Sunday at 5 PM as part of the special annual series Free for All at Town Hall. As the title suggests, tickets are free and open to the public, in keeping with the organizers' efforts to bring the highest-quality classical music performances to the widest possible audience, without the barrier of ticket costs. "We believe that great music belongs to everyone," says Free for All's presenters "and that all should feel welcome at concerts by the greatest performers of our time."

For Sunday's event, Richard Goode's first-ever Free for All at Town Hall concert, the pianist will perform works by Bach, Beethoven, Chopin, and Debussy. Tickets will be made available starting at noon on Sunday.

For more information, visit freeforallattownhall.org.

Richard Goode Northwestern Master Class to Stream Live Tonight

Music lovers the world over can be a part of a master class to be conducted by Richard Goode this evening at 7 PM CT. The world-renowned pianist will coach Northwestern University School of Music vocal students at the school's Lutkin Hall in a program including songs by Brahms, Wolf, Schumann, and Barber, with the event webcast live. To tune in, visit pickstaiger.org between 6:50 and 7 PM CT for a link to the webcast.

In addition to this evening's vocal master class, Goode will give a free piano master class tomorrow morning and a lecture-demonstration tomorrow night at the University's Pick-Staiger Concert Hall. Though these events will not be webcast, they are open to the public. For more information, visit pickstaiger.org.

Goode Continues Southbank Residency, "Poised to Perfection"

Richard Goode held the latest event of his season-long artist residency as Associate Artist at London's Southbank Centre with a concert this week at the Centre's Queen Elizabeth Hall. The Guardian gives the performance four stars, with reviewer Erica Jeal calling the Chopin-focused program, also featuring works by Bach, Mozart, and Debussy, "thoughtfully and reverently put together."

"Each time Goode returned to Chopin," writes Jeal, "it was like a homecoming." As she explains:

He found insight in the relative simplicity of the mazurkas, and even virtuoso works such as the Op. 54 Scherzo and the Op. 44 Polonaise didn't sound like tricksy showpieces ... [T]he trills near the end of the Nocturne in B, Op. 62 No 1, were poised to perfection, as were the sugar-spun runs in the Op. 36 Impromptu in F sharp, with Goode, deep in communion with the instrument, emitting a gruff purr over the top.

Jeal concludes: "This was mellow, mature playing, its emotion strongly felt but only sufficiently signalled. It takes a classy pianist to achieve that."

To read the review, visit music.guardian.co.uk/live.

The Guardian also features a profile of Goode, in which writer Andrew Clements examines the pianist's life story, from his earliest childhood piano lessons to the reluctant launch of a solo career through his breakthrough Beethoven piano sonata cycle recordings on Nonesuch to today when, Goode reports, "Basically, I play the music I love best."

As Clements sees it,

much of the work Goode does play demands just as much technical prowess as the flashier pieces he avoids. It's a matter of temperament and taste, and of knowing where his musical strengths lie. Right now, Goode is using those strengths to outstanding effect.

To read the article, visit music.guardian.co.uk/classical.

Up next in the Southbank residency, Goode will conduct a lecture-recital at Queen Elizabeth Hall tonight and a master class tomorrow afternoon in the Purcell Room. The final event in the series will be held on May 31, a concert of four-hand piano works with Richard Goode. For program and ticket information, visit southbankcentre.co.uk.

Nonesuch Artists Take Manhattan (and Brooklyn, Too) This Sunday

With the Brad Mehldau Trio's weeklong residency at New York's Village Vanguard well under way and running through Sunday, the city will also be playing host to performances by a number of Nonesuch artists this weekend.

Sérgio and Odair Assad will perform in both sessions of Sunday's Brazilian Guitar Marathon concert, a two-part, multi-artist event they co-curated. The Marathon begins at 2 PM at the 92nd Street Y and will be hosted by John Schaefer of WNYC radio. The event is part of the nearly monthlong New York Guitar Festival, which has presented more than 200 of the world's greatest guitarist since 1999, including Bill Frisell (who'll be performing upstate instead this Sunday at Peekskill's Paramount Center for the Arts) and Emmylou Harris (who'll be at Michigan's Folk Fest finishing up her tour with Patty Griffin, Shawn Colvin, and Buddy Miller). For more information on the Brazilian Guitar Marathon, visit newyorkguitarfestival.org.

Playing later Sunday afternoon on the west side of town is Richard Goode, who performs works by Bach, Chopin, Beethoven, Debussy, and Fauré at the Rose Theater as part of Lincoln Center's Great Performers events and its Virtuoso Recitals series. For further program and ticket information, visit lincolncenter.org.

Even with subway trains running on a weekend schedule, that should leave enough time for folks to head down to Brooklyn's Union Hall in Park Slope for Laura Veirs's set at 9:30 PM. Advance tickets are sold out, but a limited number of tickets will be available at show time. For more information, visit unionhallny.com.

And as always, you can find the dates and locations of Nonesuch artists' tours throughout the world on nonesuch.com by clicking the Tours button at the right.

Richard Goode, Audra McDonald, Brad Mehldau to Perform at Gilmore Festival

The schedule for the 2008 Gilmore Keyboard Festival has been released, and among the artists on the bill for the biannual event are Richard Goode, Audra McDonald, and the Brad Mehldau Trio. The Festival will be held April 24–May 13, in Kalamazoo, Michigan.

Richard Goode will perform a special prelude recital on April 13, just before the rest of the festival gets under way, with works by Bach, Beethoven, Chopin, and Debussy. On May 8, Audra will perform a vocal recital, backed by a jazz trio, interpreting songs from an ecclectic range of songwriters from Randy Newman to Rodgers & Hammerstein and the Gershwins. Brad and his trio—bassist Larry Grenadier and drummer Jorge Rossy—will perform two sets on May 2 as part of the Festival's Jazz Club series.

For complete program and ticket information, visit thegilmoreiscoming.com.

Richard Goode and Dawn Upshaw Shine Together at Southbank Centre

In today's Times (London), writer Hilary Finch gives four stars to Richard Goode's November 7 performance with Dawn Upshaw at London's Southbank Centre. The concert was the pianist's first in a series there as artist-in-residence for the 2007–08 season.

Finch gives Goode high marks for a program in which both he and his collaborator were able to shine. The pianist's solo work, which included an "always movingly lyrical performance" of Berg's Piano Sonata, was, according to Finch, "quite some feast." And for Upshaw, the reviewer notes "a new depth and focus" in the singer's work:

The bright immediacy of her excited personal response to all she sings still burns through; but now there is both more stillness and a greater urgency in how she communicates it. Berg’s seven songs were wonder-filled, warmly shared; Schoenberg’s extraordinary cycle of poems by Stefan George a performance in which both piano and voice flexed the muscle of Schoenberg’s writing, minutely attentive to its expressions through the shifting colours of every register, every movement.

To read the full review, visit timesonline.co.uk.

Richard Goode on BBC Radio 3

Richard Goode will be Petroc Trelawny's guest on BBC Radio 3's Music Matters, the station's flagship classical music program, on Saturday, November 3. The two discuss Goode's 45-year career and the joy he finds in collaborating with Dawn Upshaw, with whom he'll perform next week at London's Southbank Centre.

Music Matters begins at 12:15 GMT on Radio 3 in the UK and online at the station's radio player on bbc.co.uk/radio3. You can also find the show at the site for one week after the initial airing.

Richard Goode on His Southbank Residency, Dawn Upshaw

Richard Goode begins his artist residency as Associate Artist at London's Southbank Centre for the 2007-08 season in a November 7 concert with Dawn Upshaw. On the program is Schoenberg's Book of the Hanging Gardens; Berg's Piano Sonata, Op. 1; and songs by Debussy and Wolf. Goode describes working with Dawn as "one of the purest pleasures of my musical life." The two collaborated, notably, on a Nonesuch recording of Goethe Lieder in 1994.

The pianist recently sat down for an interview on the Southbank Centre's website to discuss his residency, which also includes a solo recital, a lecture-demonstration, a master class, and a two-piano performance with Jonathan Biss. You can listen to the interview on southbankcentre.co.uk.