It's hard not to catch Alverno Presents Director David Ravel's ebullience about the upcoming 48th season, after you realize the depth of the acts they've scheduled from September 2007 through April 2008. Some of the events will be downright bombastic.

Ravel says that the old seasons of chamber and orchestra music have given way to an array of nationally and internationally talent from the jazz, world music and contemporary dance scenes. It hasn't been easy choosing, though. Booking these shows has been "a Rubik's cube.

"There are lots and lots of individual choices and considerations, in hopes that it all kind of matches and makes sense," Ravel says. "In the end you hope that the season as a whole is greater than its parts."

Last year the season kicked off with an event not in the Pitman Theater on campus like the others, but instead Global Union 2006 debuted four miles down the road at Humboldt Park on Milwaukee's South Side. The free marathon concert event had hoped to draw 4,000 people -- but final estimates put the number closer to 6,000 in attendance.

With increased awareness of the event now, the possible expansion of vendors and craft items, and a juggled lineup, Global Union 2007 -- Sept. 15-16, 12-6:30 p.m. -- should mark the end of summer the only way Milwaukee knows how. It's really the prefect ethnocentric location both for the populace of the area and the World Music artists performing, and there is definitely enough space -- around 70 acres total (and a bandshell), compared to Cathedral Square's two acres (where Jazz in the Park is held).

Ravel says that it's easier to coordinate and book World Music groups with the help of other major cities' promoters for the same time of year.

"Sometimes they come from all over the planet, and the time zone difference is eight or nine times different," he states. "September is a good time to feature their work here."

Back at the surprisingly intimate 930-seat Pitman Theater on Alverno College's campus, the first act of the season in October is returning favorite Stefon Harris. But the critically-acclaimed vibraphonist is coming with an ambitious project in mind, rather than just soothe the audience with traditional favorites.

Harris is touring with music from an album called "African Tarantellas...Dances with Duke." Always an ardent admirer of jazz legend Duke Ellington, the 30-year-old master composer and performer arranged some lesser-known, later suites from Duke Ellington's 1970 album "The New Orleans Suite and The Queen's Suite." He then made some fresh compositions, in musical response to the originals. It's like a "vibrant" conversation between the old guard and the new.

"Stefon is an intellectually rigorous person," says Ravel. "He's engaged in some big ideas ... using music as a means to explore these ideas."

Other select acts from the season include Nov. 17 appearance of smoky singer Paula West, who started lyrically hypnotizing cabaret audiences in the 1990s. West began styling her singing after Dinah Washington, Billie Holiday and Sarah Vaughn, until she developed her own voice while working as a waitress in San Francisco with the help of accompanist Ken Muir. West now wanders through standards and then sings a song by Bob Dylan or Oscar Brown Jr.

After a rave review in an October issue of the New York Times, Paula West came across Alverno Presents' radar. Director Ravel became smitten.

"Have you heard her? Have you?" he asks. "I'm sort of determined to make her known. She's expanding our idea of the Great American Songbook."

Just in time for the winter holiday, The Klezmatics bring the Woody Guthrie Happy Joyous Hanukkah Tour on Dec. 8 at 8 p.m. Anyone familiar with the "Mermaid Avenue" albums know what fabulous thing happened: the great American folk icon Woody Guthrie left a lot of songs behind, many without being recorded or even arranged music. Guthrie's daughter Nora found them in 1998 and worked with Billy Bragg and Wilco to put out two CDs of touching, lively, and already classic music.

She also gave The Klezmatics some of the work her father wrote while married and living in Brooklyn, fostering a relationship with his then-mother-in-law and Yiddish poet Aliza Greenblatt. The band (the name is a take on the klezmer, a Jewish musical tradition steeped in spirituals) created two albums from Guthrie's work, the first called "Wonder Wheel." That album went on to win the Grammy for Best Contemporary World Music Album in 2007.

The second album was "Happy Joyous Hanukkah," to which they've added more songs from the Guthrie lyrics collection with their brand of "aching shtetl melodies, raucous Latin stomps, wild jazz riffs and provocative Arabic, African, American and Balkan rhythms," according to Alverno Presents.

Also notable are the two contemporary dance performances by David Neumann and his advanced beginners on Feb. 9, 2008 and Armitage Gone! Dance on April 12, 2008 with famed dancer and choreographer Karole Armitage.

But the season wouldn't close without the promised bang, and this year that's "Babylon Circus." Oh, where to begin? Okay, this act is 10 young Francophiles into ska, reggae and punk. But it's more cultured than it that sounds, and at the same time more mischievous. Ravel calls the group "cross-encounter programming."

There is something in the value of the live experience this season that cannot be found watching a computer or television screen. "Babylon Circus," splintered into any of three psyches at one time -- rock and roll "WWW," free jazz "Play Time," and dub/reggae Dirty Babylon Breakers -- may be the wake-up call for audiences and exclamation point for the Alverno Presents season.