The Carolina Chocolate Drops are on tour in California this week, performing at UC Santa Barbara tomorrow night. The Santa Barbara Independent spoke with band member Don Flemons to preview the show and discuss the resurgent old-time string band music scene. Fans across the country can catch the group's performance on Later ... with Jools Holland on Ovation TV tonight.

Kronos Quartet performed at Carnegie Hall on Tuesday as part of Kronos's Perspectives series, the only artist to be given such a focus this season. It also happens to coincide with the Hall's current festival of Chinese music, and, says the New York Times, "Of the many Western ensembles trooping into Carnegie to play Chinese music (or music about China) the Kronos is by far the most adept at cultural crossing over."

Ry Cooder and Nick Lowe's tour of Japan, New Zealand, and Australia begins in Nagoya, Japan, tonight. Joachim Cooder will join on drums, and singer Juliette Commagere as special guest vocalist. In the Japanese concert programs, Ry offers a short text giving a little taste of what to expect at the shows as only Cooder could. The Nonesuch Journal has an exclusive first-look at that here.

Wim Wenders's film Wings of Desire was filmed in Berlin not long before the fall of the Wall. Now, on the 20th anniversary of that event, The Criterion Collection has released DVD and Blu-ray special editions of the film it describes as "one of cinema’s loveliest city symphonies." It's a fitting description for a film set to so hauntingly memorable a score. Its soundtrack, with music by Jürgen Knieper and performances by Laurie Anderson and Nick Cave, is available in the Nonesuch Store.

Just as Wilco begins its tour through Europe in the UK tonight, the band's 2002 album Yankee Hotel Foxtrot has nabbed the No. 2 slot on the list of the 50 Best Albums of the Decade according to Paste magazine and claims the No. 1 spot in a poll of the magazine's readers. "Through its circuitous provenance and runaway success," says Paste, "Yankee Hotel Foxtrot proved that great art—even in difficult times—will find the light of day."

Steve Reich led a concert of his works at London's Royal Festival Hall last weekend. The Guardian and The Times both give it four stars, the latter calling it "spellbinding." "Three thousand people sat gripped on Saturday night by 11 musical chords elongated over 57 minutes," says The Times. "Nearly half a century has passed since Steve Reich’s first concerts, but the standing ovation after Music for 18 Musicians suggested that his brand of minimalism hasn’t lost its hypnotic allure."

Christina Courtin's hometown tour-closer in Buffalo on Friday saw the return of "a local woman who’s done well," says the Buffalo News. In a performance that alternated between "delicate lures and rocking out," Christina proved her versatility and "crooned and modulated her voice to fit whatever the music of Western civilization can throw at her."

The Black Keys were in New Orleans on Friday for a very rainy Voodoo Music Experience. The duo "rewarded the hearty souls who stood in the rain with a ferocious set," says the Times-Picayune. Creative Loafing concurs that "the Keys definitely heated it up for their hour-long set," calling it "the highlight of the day." Dan Auerbach begins a 14-day tour this Thursday.

Chris Thile joined the Alabama Symphony Orchestra for a program last Thursday that featured Thile's Mandolin Concerto and works by Bach, Bartók, and Radiohead. The Birmingham News gives the concert four stars, saying the Concerto "spotlighted not only his virtuoso solo playing, but his gift for orchestration and melodic invention in a style that could only be Chris Thile."

Steve Reich leads all-Reich program at London's Royal Festival Hall ... Leila Josefowicz, Baltimore Symphony play Adams's Violin Concerto ... Laurie Anderson opens NYU's Halloween Wonder Cabinet ... The Black Keys go Voodoo in New Orleans ... Christina Courtin plays her hometown ... Bill Frisell is in Italy ... The Low Anthem brings tour to Baton Rouge ... Brad Mehldau Trio plays Portugal ... Nicholas Payton, Don Byron, Iva Bittová convene for SFJAZZ Sacred Space ... Sara Watkins closes out tour in Indiana ... and more ...

During Punch Brothers recent tour, the Albany Times Union, declared: "Chris Thile is more than just a mandolinist. He's a musician." Thile puts that musicianship to good use in a concert with the Alabama Symphony Orchestra of works by Bach, Bartók, and Radiohead and his own Mandolin Concerto tonight. "I don't acknowledge that there are anything but superficial differences between various types of good music," Thile tells the Birmingham News. "Music is music is music."

Wilco begins its European tour next week in the UK, where Q magazine has just named Wilco (the album) among the year's best, and where Channel 4 is broadcasting Ashes of American Flags, the documentary film about the band's 2008 tour, tonight. Following the final show on Wilco's recent US tour, JamBase said the band was "clearly having a blast." You can read Nels Cline's take on it all in Paste magazine.