Best 9: Top events for the week ahead in Santa Cruz County arts & entertainment, Sept. 11-18

Here they are, nine necessary know-abouts for the week ahead. It’s the corn-dogs-and-funnel-cakes B9:

➤ The county fair is more than bad food and smelly livestock. Ideally, it’s a portrait of its community, rendered in everything from fine art to fine tomatoes. The Santa Cruz County Fair has arrived at the fairgrounds outside Watsonville, and it’s worth lingering over. Sure, you can get your turkey legs and garlic fries, and visit with the heifers and hogs. But also be sure to tour the pavilions and see the paintings, photographs and fiber arts, the collections, the culinary creations and, of course, all those fruits and vegetables. And also read the names attached to all those displays. They represent a lot of hard work and deep passion of your friends and neighbors. You might even decide to show off your prized zucchinis next year. Live entertainment this year includes the White Album Ensemble (Friday) and a Taylor Swift tribute act (Saturday). Can you get any more Americana? The fair goes through Sunday. 

➤ If you’re looking for that one degree of separation from Miles Davis, you can find it with saxophonist and bandleader Kenny Garrett, a jazz veteran who’s recorded with Miles, Art Blakey, Freddie Hubbard and many more. He’s known for his interest in the African roots of jazz, but his latest album, “Who Killed AI?”, is exploring electronic textures. He plays Kuumbwa on Monday. 

➤ Bluesy Texas-born singer-songwriter Ruthie Foster is gifted with a deeply expressive and powerful voice, which she employs in a style that touches on everything from gospel to blues to folk to soul. And she’s on top of her game, winning her first Grammy earlier this year. Foster performs live at Moe’s Alley next Thursday, Sept. 18. 

➤ Not to be confused with emo pioneers Sunny Day Real Estate (who performed in town Wednesday night), the New Jersey band Real Estate plays a hazy, almost dream-like brand of indie pop best exemplified in its 2014 album “Atlas.” The band comes to Felton Music Hall on Friday as part of a tour that’s looking back at the chill groove of “Atlas.” It’s a pretty sweet vibe.

➤ Straight outta the skit-comedy hotbed of Corralitos comes “Karen with a K,” the brainchild of writer/performer Laura February Strange, featuring the musical misadventures of the aggressive and self-righteous title character in a wild, over-the-top lampoon. It takes hold of the Kuumbwa Jazz Center on Saturday. 

➤ Singer-songwriter Edwin McCain emerged out of South Carolina back in the 1990s with a big, unapologetically passionate voice that trafficked more in soul and R&B than in country, a la the great Delbert McClinton. McCain’s muscular brand of Americana roots music lights up the Rio Theatre on Saturday. 

➤ It’s nothing short of astonishing that local music fans can see live and in person a group like Black Uhuru, one of the great bands of the reggae revival of the 1980s. But yes, the great Duckie Simpson is still touring and still exploring the deep grooves that made his group a touchstone for Jamaican reggae for decades. They come to Moe’s Alley on Saturday. 

➤ In the realm of contemporary science fiction, John Scalzi is a blue-chip name. He emerged in the early 2000s with his popular “Old Man’s War” series of novels and has since snagged several Hugo awards for his writing, which is known for its keen satirical bite and sense of humor. Scalzi visits Bookshop Santa Cruz on Sept. 18 to share his new novel, titled “The Shattering Peace.”

➤ Can you believe that the Circle Jerks are still going strong? The Jerks, you’ll remember, were a key part of the West Coast punk movement in the early Reagan years, keeping punk honest with ferocious, politically pointed jolts of energy that often lasted no more than two minutes. The Circle Jerks play a familiar old haunt, The Catalyst, on Friday.