Jake Jackson who moved to Boston two years ago is back in town and will be performing at Brigid’s Cross Irish Pub and Restaurant this Friday, Dec. 17 from 9 p.m. to midnight. Friends and fans will be able to hear Jake playing acoustic guitar with Greg Gaston on drums and Gary Broste on bass in a show featuring some original tunes by Jackson and a Christmas set of traditional songs set to different styles; some traditional folk in the Guthrie and Dylan style, some lounge jazz like Dean Martin and Frank Sinatra and an extended version of “We Saw Three Ships” with lots of improv.

Annie Lewandowski on piano and Owen Weaver on percussion will be playing a fundraiser for the Headwaters School of Music and Art scholarship fund at 3 p.m., on Sunday, December 26 at HSMA, 519 Minnesota Ave. NW. The program will include works by John Cage, Jo Kondo, and Karlheinz Stockhausen. Tickets are $5 and $10 and will be sold at the door with all proceeds going to HSMA.

Bemidji gal, Annie Lewandowski, now lives on the southern coast of England. She received her BA in piano performance from the College of St. Catherine in St. Paul in 2002, and in 2010 completed her MFA in Music Performance with a specialization in Improvisation from Mills College in Oakland, California. She performs frequently in the United States and Europe with her band “Powerdove” and as an improviser on the piano.

An international performer whose youth is no obstacle to getting dates, Annie has toured and recorded with her own group, Hawnay Troof, the Curtains, Xiu Xiu, Okay, Doublends Vert, Caroline Kraabel, the London Improviser’s Orchestra, Fred Frith, John Butcher, Chris Cutler, Charles Hayward and Pauline Oliveros.

This February, “Powerdove’s” debut recording will be released on Circle into Square records which will include CD release concerts throughout Europe. In April 2011, she will be performing a concert in London with improvisers Fred Frith and Evan Parker for broadcast on the BBC.

“Owen Weaver performs adventurous, versatile, and portable solo percussion music which utilizes recycled objects and electronic sounds ranging from the visceral to the sublime, clangorous to hypnotic–to form a unique sound world.” This was just copied from the press release because it demonstrates not only the virtuosity of Weaver and does it in a way that I can’t begin to accomplish.

Weaver has appeared twice in the New York-based Wordless Music Series as well as the Bang on a Can Summer Institute at MassMoCA, the Percussion Festival at Round Top, and Minneapolis’ Marimba Underground Concert Series. He has shared concert bills with artists from Percussion Group Cincinnati and MPDuo to international sensation DJ/Rupture and indie rockers WHY?

In 2008 Weaver collaborated with Conspirare: A Company of Voices for a television special aired nationally on PBS, the recording of which was released on the Harmonia Mundi label and nominated for a Grammy award in 2009.

How Clement Moore came to write the story, “The Night Before Christmas” is at the Minnesota Folklore Theater and the final performances are this week. The first half of the show is how the story came to be and the second part of the play is the actual portrayal of the story. They have Clement Moore and his wife and their three children, a store keeper and Santa Claus. This family show has music from the Nutcracker, sleigh bells, traditional Christmas music. It’s all about the magic of Christmas. For a theater that is only a year old, MFT has done amazing productions in their half of the downtown Laundromat. Tickets are $12 for adults, $10 for seniors and $8 for children and may be reserved on-line at minnesotafolkloretheater.org or call 652-2666. The theater is located in downtown Akeley at 6 Broad Street E.

Sarah Carlson with some helpers, Karissa Korbel, Marilyn Gandrud, Jordyn Caulfield and Megan Doyle has assembled the children’s choir and youth from the Sunday School classes at First Lutheran church in a production, “A Shepherd’s Story” by Pam Andrews. The program will be held in the sanctuary at 11 a.m. on Sunday, Dec. 19.

When Kari Munson and John Essig of Timberline leave the stage, audiences leave with auditory remembrances of their renditions of traditional folk music. Kari and John will be performing at Brigid’s Cross Pub and Restaurant this Saturday, Dec. 18 from 7 to 10 p.m. The kitchen closes at 9 p.m.

The art show at Neilson Place will be up until January but now’s the time to get there if a painting is an idea for that person who has everything. Students of Natalia Himmerska as well as some encaustics by Himmerska are on display and for sale at the gallery. Even if you don’t go to buy, at the very least, go to look. Some of the work is outstanding and also very affordable.

That’s all she wrote, folks.