The Big Gigs: What to watch in the next seven days

POP/ROCK Big on the jam-band circuit, Chicago's Umphrey's McGee offers a different kettle of Phish on the new "Mantis," their fifth studio album. This is serious music-making, with carefully constructed tunes and touches of Rush, XTC and even the Beach Boys. Wonder how they'll improvise with these songs during this weekend's three-night stand? Each night will be a new adventure. (9 p.m. today, 7 p.m. Sat. & 5 p.m. Sun. First Avenue, $20.) (J.B.)

Aussie actress/songstress Lenka performs her frothy piano pop on a multi-act, KS95-sponsored bill headlined by Augustana, whose own piano pop has added a little rock muscle of late. Punk-popsters Plain White T's ("Hey There Delilah") also perform. (6 p.m. today, Varsity Theater, $16.) (J.B.)

After last year's surprisingly smooth reunion tour with Stone Temple Pilots and his not-so-surprisingly rough split from Velvet Revolver, Scott Weiland -- the addiction-beleaguered frontman for both bands -- went and made a solo album. Like his little-heard 1998 solo debut, "Happy in Golashes" is all over the map, with lots of downbeat ballads and angsty songs inspired by his faltering marriage and his brother's death, plus some dancey numbers and only a few tracks that rock as hard as his better-known work. His band on tour includes his principal "Happy" collaborator, producer/guitarist Doug Grean, who has also worked with STP and Sheryl Crow. (8 p.m. Sat., Pantages Theatre, 710 Hennepin Av. S., Mpls. $35.) (C.R.)

Vic Chesnutt seems to revel in seemingly unlikely collaborations with fellow adventure-seekers. His latest teamwork was done with fellow Athens, Ga., mainstays Elf Power, part of the Elephant 6 clan of psychedelic folk/indie-rock musicians. Their record, "Dark Developments," offers a lovably strange mix of hazy, Velvet Underground-y rock, but Chesnutt's sardonic wit and obtuse writing style are still out front. They're on tour all month, culminating in an R.E.M. tribute show at Carnegie Hall. Radiohead-sounding local band Yer Cronies opens. (9 p.m. Sat., 400 Bar. 18 & older. $10.) (C.R.)

Classy piano popster Melissa Manchester is a good choice as first musical act at the new Burnsville Performing Arts Center. With her outgoing personality, Minnesota connections (her hubby's from Edina) and enduring hits ("Midnight Blue," "Don't Cry Out Loud"), she'll give the 1,000-seat room an appropriate christening. (8 p.m. Sat., Burnsville Performing Arts Center, $25-$100.) (J.B.)

One of the hottest U.K. hard-rock bands of the moment, Welsh quintet Funeral for a Friend is out supporting its fourth album, "Memory and Humanity," featuring big, anthemic choruses and stormy guitar work, part Foo Fighters and part Avenged Sevenfold. New York-based opener the Sleeping has its third album coming soon. (6 p.m. Sat., Station 4. All ages. $13-$15.) (C.R.)

A band that can actually boast of being jailed simply for playing rock 'n' roll, Russia's Mumiy Troll ("mummies' troll") has been around long enough to see the Soviet Union fade and Western music rise in popularity back home. But it has never done a U.S. tour until now. Its new album, "Comrade Ambassador," sounds like a vodka-chasing mix of Bauhaus and Pearl Jam. (9 p.m. Sat., 7th Street Entry. 18 & older. $10.) (C.R.)

After spending much of last year filling his MVP role as the Black Crowes' new guitarist, Luther Dickinson is back with brother Cody in the group they rode in on, the North Mississippi All-Stars. The sons of renowned Memphis producer Jim Dickinson -- raised on raw, rural Delta blues and garagey rock 'n' roll -- have riveted audiences with their hard-stomping, heavy-sweating, two-hour-plus gigs for over a decade now, captured on a new two-CD/one-DVD live retrospective, "Do It Like We Used to Do." They're touring with the Hill Country Revue, a five-piece lineup that Cody and bassist Chris Chew sometimes head up with or without Luther. (9 p.m. Thu., Cabooze. 18 & older. $16-$19.) (C.R.)

On her way to becoming a Grammy-winning banjoist, Alison Brown graduated from Harvard University and UCLA, worked as an investment banker, spent four years in Alison Krauss + Union Station and served as Michelle Shocked's music director. As a recording artist, Brown, like Bela Fleck, is a genre-blender, merging elements of acoustic jazz, Celtic and newgrass. She'll preview tunes from her 10th album, "The Company You Keep," due March 3. Opening is Joe Craven, a former David Grisman sideman who plays everything from violin to bed pan. (7:30 p.m. Thu., Cedar Cultural Center, $18-$20.) (J.B.)

COUNTRY Keith Anderson had to have vocal-cord surgery, so the Lost Trailers have been enlisted to close the World's Toughest Rodeo. Good choice -- the Trailers are a good ol' Southern rock bar-band that demonstrated a bunch of Big & Rich attitude on their 2008 hip-hop-loving hit "Holler Back." (Rodeo at 7:30 p.m. Sat. with music afterward. Xcel Energy Center, $17-$47.) (J.B.)

VOCAL Cantus got its start as a Twin Cities vocal ensemble in the mid-1990s when Bobby McFerrin was creative chair of the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, but these two vocal forces never worked together. Their debut collaboration will be tonight, on "Let Your Voice Be Heard," the spiritual "Deep River" and other selections. Cantus, an all-male ensemble that essays everything from baroque to folk, and McFerrin, the Grammy-winning vocal wonder at home with everything from jazz to classical, also will perform separately. (8 p.m. today, Orchestra Hall, $22-$53, 612-371-5656.) (J.B.)

JAZZ There will no video games at this weekend's "Jazz Guitar Hero" showcases -- just real six-string aces working their fretboard magic. Tonight it's chameleonic charmer Dean Magraw, ever-funky Billy Franze and gypsy-jazz specialist Sam Miltich. Saturday features avant/free-bop fave Dean Granros, Chris Olson from the hip band Framework and recent McNally-Smith grad Cory Wong. (9 p.m. today-Sat., Artists' Quarter. $10.) (T.S.)

FOLK Scottish fiddle great Alasdair Fraser has a mile-long résumé that includes the "Last of the Mohicans" and "Titanic" soundtracks, but his work with young American cellist Natalie Haas is anything but Hollywood glitzy. Their debut CD, "Fire & Grace," was named Scots trad album of the year. While its follow-up, "In the Moment," concentrates on original material, it's still chamber folk steeped in Celtic traditions. Haas is also known for her fine work with Mark O'Connor's Appalachia Waltz Trio -- she replaced Yo Yo Ma in the group. (8 p.m. Sat., Cedar Cultural Center. $18-$20.) (T.S.)

CLASSICAL Performances of Olivier Messiaen's "Quartet for the End of Time" have not been scarce in these precincts of late, but this extraordinary music -- written and premiered in a German prison camp, and testifying to the power of work in the midst of war -- merits repetition. Hear it played by pianist Claudia Chen and three members of the Minnesota Orchestra in a program that also includes Schubert's Variations on an Original Theme for piano four hands, with Mark Mazullo joining Chen at the keyboard. (2 p.m. Sun., Janet Wallace Fine Arts Center, Macalester College, 130 Macalester St., St. Paul. Free.) (L.F.)