BEST BETS Thursday 3/15

COSTA MESA

8pm

Music

Early music specialists Jordi Savall and Hesperion XXI will play a “Paradise Lost” program, consisting of music composed from the time of King Alfonso X of Castille and Leon (1221-1284). Himself a composer, Alfonso X was known for his knowledge and for fostering communication among Christian, Jewish and Islamic intellectuals. Joining the ensemble in its Performing Arts Center debut, will be soprano Monserrat Figueras, Savall’s wife.

* Jordi Savall and Hesperion XXI, Founders Hall, Orange County Performing Arts Center, 600 Town Center Drive, Costa Mesa. 8 p.m. $48. (714) 556-2787.

ANAHEIM

8:30pm

Pop Music

The eternally harmonizing Everly Brothers had to scrub their stop in Orange County last fall when the elder Everly, Don, came down with throat problems. The date’s back on for Thursday at the Sun Theatre, where they’ll be joined as originally planned by veteran folkie Ramblin’ Jack Elliott, the Woody Guthrie disciple whose career is on the upswing again thanks to an acclaimed film documentary, “The Ballad of Ramblin’ Jack,” directed, produced and co-written by his daughter, Aiyana Elliott.

* The Everly Brothers, Ramblin’ Jack Elliott, Sun Theatre, 2200 E. Katella Ave., Anaheim. 8:30 p.m. $35 and $45. (714) 712-2700.

SAN JUAN CAPISTRANO

8pm

Pop Music

In the tradition of the Grateful Dead, the David Nelson Band, another Bay Area jam-loving group, encourages fans to tape its concerts, as long as the tapes aren’t offered for sale. The band, fronted by New Riders of the Purple Sage founder David Nelson, even likes to hear the results and asks fans to dupe them copies of their best recordings. So grab your Walkman or DAT recorders and head down to the Coach House and let ‘em roll.

* David Nelson Band, Coach House, 33157 Camino Capistrano, San Juan Capistrano. 8 p.m. $10 to $12. (949) 496-8930.

ANAHEIM

9pm

Pop Music

Steve Earle, who brings his folk-rock-country mix to Southern California’s two House of Blues locales, will soon add another vocation to his singer-songwriter-producer-

activist-teacher hyphenates: author. His first collection of fiction, “Doghouse Roses,” will be published in June.

* Steve Earle, House of Blues, 1530 S. Disneyland Drive, Anaheim. 9 p.m. $25. (714) 778-2583. Also Friday at the House of Blues, 8430 Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood. 9 p.m. $25. (323) 848-5100.

COSTA MESA

7:45pm

Theater

Cruelty and comedy entwine in “The Lonesome West,” a decidedly unsentimental portrait of life in rural Ireland by the young Anglo-Irish playwright Martin McDonagh. McDonagh’s knack for inducing laughter and shock made his “Beauty Queen of Leenane” a popular draw when it played last year at South Coast. “The Lonesome West,” a Tony Award nominee in 1999, is set in the same desolate, impoverished town in Galway. Brothers Coleman and Valene Connor seem capable of enacting the worst of the Cain-and-Abel and Jacob-and-Esau models of sibling dysfunction; Father Welsh, the priest driven to drink by the harshness and callousness of his flock, makes a last-ditch effort to redeem the brothers--and himself--in this place where “God has no jurisdiction.”

* “The Lonesome West,” South Coast Repertory’s Second Stage, 655 Town Center Drive, Costa Mesa. Tuesdays through Sundays, 7:45 p.m.; matinees Saturdays and Sundays, 2 p.m. Preview tonight, regular performances begin Friday. $18 to $47, with a pay-what-you-will matinee on Saturday. Through April 15. (714) 708-5555.