THURSDAY NOVEMBER 14



GUST BURNS ENSEMBLE

The Earshot Jazz Festival might be over, but Voice and Vision, an ongoing series dedicated to adventurous improvisers, marches on. This month's gig features pianist Gust Burns, who has written music that focuses "on the interconnections and juxtapositions of composed and freely improvised sections" for an assortment of quartets and octets. Seattle Asian Art Museum, 1400 E Prospect, Volunteer Park, 547-6763, 7 pm, $7.

FRIDAY NOVEMBER 15



MUCHO MONTEVERDI

Claudio Monteverdi (1567-1643) is one of the greatest composers of vocal music in the last 500 years. The Early Music Guild and Seattle Early Dance team up to mount two dramas from Monteverdi's Eighth Book of Madrigals, Il Combattimento di Tancredi e Clorinda and Il ballo delle ingrate. Since fully staged (costumes, dancing) and professionally played (with period instruments to boot!) chamber operas remain a rarity in our burg, this show is a treat. Also Sat Nov 16 at 8 pm. Town Hall, Eighth and Seneca, 325-7066, 8 pm, $10-$29.

SUNDAY NOVEMBER 17



HENRY BRANT

While the layout of European churches inspired baroque-era composers to write for antiphonal choirs of brass and other instruments, Henry Brant took it several steps further and scattered instrumentalists throughout the hall, along the walls, under the stage, and up in the balcony. Brant, one of the true pioneers of American music, started writing spatial music back in the 1950s and is still composing today at the age of 89. The Seattle Flute Society performs the American premiere of Brant's Ghost and Gargoyles--a sequel to Angels & Devils written eons ago in 1932--as well as his Mass in Gregorian. For more flute frenzy, the SFS ventures into Janice Giteck's When the Crones Stop Counting for multiple flute ensemble. Town Hall, Eighth and Seneca, 425-831-5073, 7:30 pm, $10-$17.

TUESDAY NOVEMBER 19



BIG ELECTRIC CAT

Why drive to Bellingham for this concert of experimental electro-acoustic music? Because unlike some ostrich-eared college music professors, curator Bruce Hamilton understands that there is a truckload of good unheard sound art made both inside and outside the groves (or in Bellingham's case, dripping conifers) of academia. Works for performers and interactive computer by Raymond May and Bruce Hamilton, works by Colby Leider, James Mobberley, Flanger, and Merzbow (yes, that Merzbow), plus Ligeti's classic Artikulation, give WWU's excellent sound system a run for the money. Oh, and the campus is a maze, so arrive early. Old Main Theater, Western Washington University, Bellingham, 360-650-3711, 8 pm, free.

WEDNESDAY NOVEMBER 20



KARIN McCOLLOUGH

Of all instrumentalists, I think pianists tend to be the most perversely eclectic. Case in point: Karin McCollough dives into a passel of piano music ranging from Albeniz to Debussy. On the program: Puck by Edvard Grieg, one of Debussy's Arabesques, the Mazurka in A Minor op. 67 no. 4 by Frederic Chopin, Mozart's standard-issue Sonata in C Major K. 330, and the Tango in D Major by Isaac Albeniz. Sherman-Clay Piano & Organ, 1624 Fourth Ave, 622-7580, 12:15 pm, free.