Best Bets Orange County HERE AND NEAR

TODAY

8pm

Music

Pianist Vladimir Feltsman will perform the dual role of conductor and soloist in this Pacific Symphony program devoted to the music of Bach. On tap are the Orchestral Suites Nos. 2 and 3 and the Keyboard Concertos Nos. 1 and 4. The Moscow-born pianist has taught at SUNY New Paltz for the last 10 years and has recorded extensively.

* “Best of Bach,” Orange County Performing Arts Center, 600 Town Center Drive, Costa Mesa. 8 p.m. $17-$48. (714) 556-2787.

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TODAY

7:30pm

Dance

Balanchine’s “Serenade” was the first ballet he created in America. Victoria Simon, repetiteur for the George Balanchine Trust, is teaching the work to students at the Orange County High School of the Arts. They will dance it and works by Donald McKayle, Lynn Cox, Gary McKenzie and Tee Ross on this “Serenade for Spring” concert.

* “Serenade for Spring,” Martha B. Knoebel Dance Theatre, Cal State Long Beach, 6200 Atherton Road. 7:30 p.m. Also Saturday, 2 and 8 p.m. $8 preconcert; $10 at the door. (562) 596-1435.

TODAY

8pm

Jazz

Saxophonist Phil Norman gathers some of the best of Southern California’s musicians to play in the West Coast jazz tradition of Dave Pell, Gerry Mulligan and others. The group’s standouts include pianist Bob Florence, drummer Frank Capp, trumpeters Carl Saunders and Ron Stout, saxophonist Roger Neumannn and others.

Phil Norman Tentet, Restaurant Kikuya, 8052 Adams Ave., Huntington Beach. 8 p.m. No cover, $10 minimum. (714) 536-6665.

FRIDAY

8pm

Dance

Choreographer David Allan uses two scores by Henryk Gorecki for his 1996 ballet “Out of the Shadows”--the “Quasi Una Fantasia” and the Second String Quartet. Ballet Pacifica dances the work on a program that also includes the world premiere of Paul Vasterling’s “Saltimbanques,” the West Coast premiere of Lynne Taylor-Corbett’s “Spy” and Stephen Mills’ “The Naughty Ones.”

* Ballet Pacifica, Irvine Barclay Theatre, 4242 Campus Drive. 8 p.m. Also Saturday, 2:30 and 8 p.m. $17-$20. (949) 854-4607.

FRIDAY

all day

Movies

His Q-rating may not be as high as his cartoon brethren from “Rugrats,” but Doug Funnie from ABC’s popular Saturday morning series “Disney’s Doug” is about to make his feature film debut in the aptly titled “Doug’s 1st Movie.” In the film, the wily 12-year-old and his best friend, Skeeter, discover a monster in Lucky Duck Lake, and Doug contemplates asking pretty Patti Mayonnaise to the school dance.

* “Doug’s 1st Movie” opens Friday in general release.

FRIDAY

all day

Movies

In last summer’s hit film “The Truman Show,” Jim Carrey played a man whose entire life had been broadcast on television, unbeknownst to him. Now director Ron Howard gives us the flip side of that scenario with “EdTV”: Matthew McConaughey plays Ed Pekurny, a laid-back slacker-type who agrees to let a cable television camera crew follow him around 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Ed quickly becomes a pop-culture icon, spawning fan clubs, imitators and even stalkers. Woody Harrelson, Jenna Elfman, Ellen DeGeneres, Dennis Hopper, Elizabeth Hurley, Sally Kirkland and Martin Landau round out the cast.

* “EdTV” opens Friday in general release.

FRIDAY

8pm

Theater

More people have probably seen George and Ira Gershwin’s “Porgy and Bess” than any other opera. Part of the reason is this Living Arts production, which has toured 150 cities in six years and is still going strong. For five performances only, it’s making a stop in Cerritos, with Houston Grand Opera’s Elizabeth Graham and LaRose Saxon alternating as Bess. Saxon has also played Bess with the Frankfurt Opera and the Phoenix Symphony. This widely acclaimed company is directed by Will Roberson. Based on DuBose Heyward’s novel, and its stage version “Porgy,” the opera celebrates the turbulent life on Charleston’s Catfish Row.

“Porgy and Bess,” Cerritos Center for Performing Arts, 12700 Center Court Drive. 8 p.m. Also Saturday, 2 and 8 p.m.; and Sunday, 2 and 7 p.m. $32-$47. (800) 300-4345 or (562) 916-8500.

FRIDAY

8:30pm

Jazz

Pianist Billy Childs has amassed an impressive list of credits that includes performing with trombonist J.J. Johnson, trumpeter Freddie Hubbard and vocalist Dianne Reeves. His own albums for Windham Hill Jazz, Shanachie and Chick Corea’s Stretch labels have won him further accolades, as have his compositions for classical orchestras. Here, he’ll work with a trio.

Billy Childs Trio, Steamers Cafe, 138 W. Commonwealth Ave., Fullerton. 8:30 p.m. $5, two-drink minimum. (714) 871-8800.

SATURDAY

8pm

Music

In its first local appearance since Mariss Jansons was appointed music director of the Pittsburgh Symphony in 1996, the orchestra will play Sibelius’ Symphony No. 1 and Berlioz’s “Symphonie Fantastique” under his direction at the Orange County Performing Arts Center. Jansons, born in Riga, Latvia, in 1943, also holds posts with the Oslo, London and St. Petersburg philharmonic orchestras.

* Pittsburgh Symphony, Orange County Performing Arts Center, 600 Town Center Drive, Costa Mesa. 8 p.m. $20-$60. (714) 556-2787.

SUNDAY

4pm

Latin Jazz

Trumpeter Jesus Alemany’s 12-piece Cuban dance band Cubanismo! is a commandingly rhythmic ensemble with a powerful brass section. Its previous L.A. appearances have been lengthy, intoxicating affairs that kept people moving to rumba, mambo and pop beats. The group has just begun the most extensive U.S. tour of any Cuban ensemble in the last 40 years. Saturday’s stop is at House of Blues in West Hollywood; Sunday’s performance is in Irvine.

* Cubanismo!, Irvine Barclay Theatre, 4242 Campus Drive. 4 p.m., $24-$28. (949) 854-4646. House of Blues, 8430 Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood. (323) 848-5100.

SATURDAY

8pm

Comedy

Is magic funny? It is when Saddleback College’s McKinney Theatre brings back “An Evening of Comedy and Magic” for a return engagement. This year’s all-new lineup features internationally known magicians, all with an infectious sense of humor, from Hollywood’s Magic Castle, Las Vegas and beyond. Featured are Magic Castle’s two-time Magician of the Year Tom Ogden, after a quarter of a century of fooling the folks and making them giggle; Lee Bayless, a top-rated close-up magician and a comedy writer; and with multiple international awards in his magic hat, Muray, Canada’s newest young magic star. Also featured are Mike Elkan, international favorite with a comic flair with classical magic, and the Wilsons, a husband-wife team recently held over for six months at Universal CityWalk’s Wizardz Dinner Theatre.

“An Evening of Comedy and Magic,” McKinney Theatre, Saddleback College, 28000 Marguerite Parkway, Mission Viejo. 8 p.m. $16-$21. (949) 582-4656.

SUNDAY

3:30pm

Pop Music

It all started with a series of free Sunday concerts in the parking lot of the International Surf Museum. But when the museum staffers didn’t have any artists for March 28, they decided to open it up as a jam session for musicians from surf bands. Well, it grew, and grew, and then next thing they knew they had the Ultimate Surfin’ Sunday Rendezvous Ballroom Reunion on their hands. The parking lot was too small, so they moved over to the Newport Beach Hard Rock Cafe, where Dick Dale, the Surfaris and members of the Chantays, the Bel Airs and other groups will play the unique blend of rhythm and blues, jazz, flamenco and country that melded into surf music in the 1950s and 1960s. If you can’t get into the show, you can always visit the museum, which has a new exhibition on surf music on display through July.

* Ultimate Surfin’ Sunday Rendezvous Ballroom Reunion, Hard Rock Cafe, Newport Fashion Island, 451 Newport Center Drive, Newport Beach. 3:30-7:30 p.m. $30. Sold out. International Surfing Museum, 411 Olive Ave., Huntington Beach. (714) 960-3483.