Percussionists feel the power
By Bob Blumenthal
Irvin Mayfield and Bill Summers of Los Hombres Calientes Drumming is the focal point of this week's jazz calendar, with several major percussionists in town to play and teach. The jazz highlight of Berklee's Percussion Week is tonight's collaboration by two leaders of the younger drum generation, Lewis Nash and Yoron Israel, at Berklee Performance Center (617-266-7455), with Nash moving over to New England Conservatory (617-585-1100) for 2 p.m. master classes in the school's Keller Room on Tuesday and Wednesday. Conga drummer Poncho Sanchez and band complete their stay at Scullers (617-562-4111) tonight. Los Hombres Calientes has the dual percussion power of Bill Summers and Cuba's Horacio "El Negro" Hernandez, plus Summers' co-leader Irvin Mayfield on trumpet, at the Regattabar (617-876-7777) tomorrow and Saturday. "Dancing on Drums" features living legend Max Roach, pianist Connie Crothers, and dancer Dianne Walker with the Harvard University Jazz Band at Sanders Theatre (617-495-1642) on Saturday.

At Avalon, hair-raising rockers
By Steve Morse, Globe Staff
Mary Huff, singer for Southern Culture on the Skids, professes to have 150 wigs. That must be some kind of record by rock 'n' roll standards. For its zany fashion sense, the band has been called a trash-rocking counterpart to the B-52's, with some punk and swamp-funk thrown in for good measure. See for yourself tonight at Avalon (617-262-2424), where the band, whose latest album is riotously titled "Liquored Up and Lacquered Down," shares a bill with Cowboy Mouth. Also tonight: comeback hard-rockers Tesla at the Orpheum (617-482-0651), favorite son J. Mascis & the Fog at the Middle East Downstairs (617-497-0576), and acclaimed new singer-songwriter Nelly Furtado at Lupo's in Providence (401-272-5876).

Jacqueline Schwab
By Scott Alarik, Globe Coresspondent
Pianist Jacqueline Schwab is best known for her sparely eloquent work on Ken Burns's epic public television documentaries "The Civil War" and "Baseball." She has a rare gift for finding the emotional center of vintage American music, and should shine Saturday, 8 p.m., at the chamber-quiet Homegrown Coffeehouse, First Parish Church, Great Plain and Dedham avenues in Needham Center (781-444-7478). ... The venerable Nameless Coffeehouse, 3 Church St. in Harvard Square, hosts its annual benefit Saturday, 8 p.m., with endearingly eclectic Worcester duo Valerie and Walter Crockett, Stephanie Corby, Raelinda Woad, and Linda Sharar (617-864-1630). ... The exhilarating, legendary Silverleaf Gospel Singers hold court at Club Passim Friday, 8 p.m. Provocative Asian-American songwriter Kevin So is there Saturday, 7 and 10 p.m., and Sunday, 7:30 p.m. (617-492-7679). Tom Pacheco, '70s songwriting star, appears at the Steeple Coffeehouse, Route 30 in Southborough Center, Saturday, 8 p.m. (508-485-4847).

From Italy, a conductor of note
By Richard Dyer, Globe Staff
The Italian conductor Rinaldo Alessandrini has revolutionized the performance standards of early music in Italy and enlarged the public's understanding of Italian music of several periods. His revelatory recordings of Monteverdi madrigals with his ensemble Concerto Italiano have won international awards and found a devoted public. Alessandrini makes his eagerly awaited Boston debut with the Handel & Haydn Society in a pair of concerts Friday at 8 in Jordan Hall and Sunday at 3 in Sanders Theatre. The program includes Vivaldi's popular "Gloria" (with sopranos Roberta Anderson and Gail Abbey and mezzo-soprano Judith Malafronte as the soloists) and a less familiar work, the "Stabat Mater" of Antonio Bononcini, with soprano Pamela Murray, Malafronte, tenor Ryan Turner, and bass Donald Wilkinson.