For the first time in three years, an annually beloved holiday-music tradition returns to the area as the professional vocal ensemble the Nova Singers presents its latest A Nova Christmas concerts, with exciting and moving arrangements of non-secular, classical, traditional, and contemporary holiday favorites performed December 16 at Davenport's St. Paul Lutheran Church and December 17 at Galesburg's First Lutheran Church.

An inventive and riotous improv-comedy troupe that has been performing in the Quad Cities for more than a decade, Wisenheimer will both celebrate its 11th anniversary and bid adieu to the long-running "Late Nite Shows" series in the ensemble's December 16 performance, a Black Box Theatre event boasting the wild comic imaginations of group members Jeff De Leon, Jen Kuhle, and Leslie Mitchell.

The winners of a Country Music Association Award, three CMT Country Music Awards, and an Academy of Country Music Award citation for Vocal Group of the Year, the chart-topping touring artists of Sawyer Brown headline a December 15 concert at East Moline's The Rust Belt, the group's 41 years of performance boasting such career highlights as a Star Search championship win and three number-one singles on the Billboard Hot County Songs chart.

Best known as the founder and lead vocalist/guitarist for the alternative-country and Americana ensemble American Aquarium, singer/songwriter BJ Barham plays special solo sets at Davenport's Raccoon Motel on December 16 and 17, the artist's 2016 album Rockingham lauded by No Depression for its artist's “ability to capture depth and emotion that is on par with few others.”