Music with international flavor, plus more from Ellington's world

The tone is decidedly international on this season's jazz schedule, with the local return of Holland's Willem Breuker Kollektief among the major events.

Breuker last brought his 11-piece band to the area in May 1998, but promises a different program for his Oct. 2 concert at Harvard University's Agassiz Theatre. "We always like new repertoire," the composer-saxophonist explained from his Amsterdam office, "so we'll do pieces written in the last year. That keeps the whole thing very fresh. Since we play so often - 80-100 concerts a year, mostly in Europe - we have to produce a lot, but that's OK."

Sustaining the output is no problem for the prolific Breuker, who has kept the Kollektief stocked with style-spanning music for a quarter-century. "When we're not performing, I'm composing," he said, "for films and television and symphonies as well. I don't like going to the cinema or reading the papers, but I do listen to the radio all day. I like to work with noises behind me, getting all my information at the same time, and that's how I operate from 10 in the morning to 2 at night - with occasional important trips to the Frigidaire."

An abundance of information and humor is characteristic of Breuker's music, and should also define the clinic he is presenting on Oct. 4 at the Agassiz Theatre. "Our workshops are always different, depending upon the level of the musicians who show up," he said. "But it gives people the chance to take the trombone part, for example, and become a member of the Kollektief for a few minutes. And it's an open thing, a human thing, so everyone can ask whatever they want. What we do is not a secret, coming from another world. We are human beings who make music."

International Piano Weekend

Other illustrious Dutchmen will arrive on Nov. 13, when the ICP Octet (Misha Mengelberg, Ab Baars, Tristan Honsinger, et al.) appears as part of the Boston Creative Music Alliance's fall season. Other BCMA concerts (all of which will be held at the ICA Theater) include an International Piano Weekend, with German pianist Georg Grawe in a trio (Nov. 19) and Canadian Paul Plimley on a solo double bill with the locally based Hans Poppel (Nov. 20). And a second major residency finds Benny Golson at New England Conservatory for a master class (Sept. 28) and concert (Sept. 29).

Cuban musicians will be in even greater abundance, beginning this week with Jane Bunnett's Spirits of Havana (Tuesday) and Arturo Sandoval (Thursday), both at Scullers, and Eliades Ochoa of the Buena Vista Social Club at the House of Blues (Wednesday). The Symphony Hall appearance of Buena Vista alum Ibrahim Ferrer and Ruben Gonzalez (Oct. 24) is sold out (they return Feb. 1 to the Orpheum Theatre), but there will be visits by fellow Buena Vistan Company Segundo (Berklee Performance Center, Nov. 5), and the equally celebrated Los Van Van (the Roxy, Oct. 3), and Irakere (Berklee Performance Center, Nov. 6).

Other musical ambassadors include Brazil's Gilberto Gil (Lowell Auditorium, Saturday) and Carlos Malta with Trio Da Paz (Scullers, Oct. 7), Sweden's AALY Trio and Mats Gustafsson with Ken Vandermark (Killian Hall at MIT, Sept. 19) and Bill Bruford's Earthworks from England (Regattabar, Sept. 29).

Columbus Day weekend features two of the more imaginative events in this Ellington centennial year. The 22d annual John Coltrane Memorial Concert (Blackman Auditorium, Northeastern, Oct. 9) will present music from the album "Duke Ellington and John Coltrane" plus each man's sacred music, with Yusef Lateef, Cecil McBee, and a string quartet joining the local all-star lineup. "Rockin' in Rhythm: The Small Band Music of Duke Ellington" (Sanders Theatre, Oct. 10) is an intriguing Jazz at Lincoln Center project under the direction of Nicholas Payton, with special guests Dianne Reeves and Joe Lovano.

More Ellington sacred music will be performed at the Christmas concert of the Aardvark Jazz Orchestra (Arlington Street Church, Dec. 19), which opens its season premiering an extended work by director Mark Harvey (Central Congregational Church, Jamaica Plain, Oct. 2). Another venerable local series begins the same evening, as Highland Jazz presents Stan Strickland and Laszlo Gardony in its new location (Episcopal Church, Needham).

As usual, there will be several guitarists working their way through the area, including Sonic Youth's Thurston Moore in solo and trio settings (Old Cambridge Baptist Church, Thursday), Scott Henderson with Tribal Tech (Johnny D's, Sept. 22), a John Scofield/Charlie Hunter double bill (Sanders Theatre, Sept. 24), acoustic wizard Richard Leo Johnson with the California Guitar Trio (Johnny D's, Oct. 13) and Paco de Lucia's sextet (Symphony Hall, Nov. 14).

Scullers celebrates its 10th anniversary with a slew of plectrists, including Al DiMeola (Oct. 20), Tuck & Patti (Oct. 21-22), a J. Geils/Duke Robillard/Gerry Beaudoin summit (Oct. 26-27), and Larry Carlton (Nov. 26-27), but the main attraction will be the Gil Evans Orchestra (Oct. 28-29), led by the late arranging genius's son Miles and featuring Lew Soloff and Chris Hunter, among others.

Regattabar's best

Best of the Regattabar's schedule includes a Stefon Harris/Jason Moran/Greg Osby triple bill (Oct. 5-6), Bobby Hutcherson (Nov. 11-13), Michael Brecker's new organ group with Larry Goldings (Nov. 18-20), and chances to hear Dave McKenna with both Donna Byrne (Oct. 8-9) and Scott Hamilton (Nov. 5-6).

And those who already miss summer jazz road trips might head north later this month, when the vocal/piano duo of Meredith d'Ambrosio and Eddie Higgins performs (Press Room, Portsmouth, N.H., Sept. 26).