* AV PICK * Saturday, March 15

k.d. lang

One can imagine a little girl named Kathryn Dawn Lang growing up as she did in the remote village of Consort, Alberta, Canada (pop. 739). Maybe you can almost see her, indistinguishable from any other kid way out there on the high prairie, watching you from an immense, flat field as your car passes through on the way from Saskatoon to Red Deer. How would you have ever known that the youngster you just drove past possessed one of the greatest voices of her generation? Thankfully for us, k.d. lang wasn’t the kind of person to keep her abilities hidden among the wheat fields and cattle yards. Early on she developed a fascination with the countrypolitan arias of Patsy Cline. Her first band was called the Reclines in tribute to the tragic Nashville diva—an early example of the sly humor that is as much a part of her persona as her incomparable set of pipes. While her early releases were aimed more or less at the country market, it seems impossible, in retrospect, that any one musical genre could have ever contained a spirit that’s as expansive as the big-sky country of her childhood. Now 25 years into an extraordinary career that’s been filled with awards and has seen her move from rockabilly to pop to salsa to jazzy torch ballads, lang remains a seemingly effortless singer with perfect pitch and breathtaking control. She is touring in support of Watershed, her second release on the Nonesuch label, and the first where she adds to her writing, singing and instrumental credits the role of sole producer. The unique opener is solo pianist Dustin O’Halloran, whose beautiful melodies can also be heard in his work with genre-bending duo the Devics.

—buck quigley

8pm. Mainstage Theatre, UB Center for the Arts,

North Campus. (645-ARTS/ubcfa.org) $65, $55, $3