Gillian Welch

Dave Rawlings and Gillian Welch apparently had their fill of Legal Sea Foods while in town. The pair, who played two nights at the Wilbur Theatre, told the crowd on the second night they were stuffed with shellfish from Roger Berkowitz 's restaurant. Rawlings, who grew up in Rhode Island, revealed that most of his family was in the audience… . Pats cornerback Kyle Arrington and his agent, Sean Stellato , had dinner at the Kowloon… . PR poobah George Regan hosted a holiday party at his Marina Bay manse and the crowd included a lot of clients,...

PICK OF THE DAY Clowning around The cozy one-ring Big Apple Circus is back for its annual visit with ‘‘Dream Big!," a new show chock -full of juggling, acrobats, animal acts, and flying trapeze artists. It's also the farewell tour for Barry Lubin, who'll will be donning his curly gray wig and yellow support hose for the Big Apple for one last run. See the International Clown Hall of Famer transform ed into the lovable Grandma alongside acts including the Flying Cortes, Russian juggler Dmitry Chernov, the Chinese Shandong Acrobats, Swiss hand balancer Melanie Chy, and Jenny Vidbel and her Arabian horses and dynamic...

As Gillian Welch has promoted her long-awaited new album, “The Harrow & The Harvest,’’ there comes a point early in each interview when a reporter asks her why it took her eight years to deliver it. Every. Single. Time. There’s no good answer, of course. These things occasionally take a while. Welch knows this is not the satisfying, tabloid-flavored answer people are looking for — marriages, divorces, babies! — but it’s the truth. “No one wanted this record out faster than we did,’’ Welch said with a small laugh.

Even Grammy voters don't know what to do with The Civil Wars. The duo has been nominated for best folk album and best country duo/group performance, two categories that bear little resemblance to each other. Fellow nominees run the spectrum from Kenny Chesney to Eddie Vedder to Gillian Welch and Fleet Foxes. And John Paul White and Joy Williams love it. "We kind of had a little bit of a grin between the two of us and our team as well about that, too," Williams said. "I think it's fun the fact that we can't be pigeon-holed into one or the other.

Crooked Still plays traditional songs with a contemporary sensibility. Like Gillian Welch, the young band makes old music sound new. "Hop High" is seductive and exciting. Aoife O'Donovan's gauzy voice rips through Welch's "Orphan Girl" as the banjo races and the bass and cello groove. The unusual instrumentation gives the music a dark, mysterious sound. These guys can play: Cellist Rushad Eggleston was nominated for a Grammy with band Fiddlers 4, O'Donovan sings with the jazz/bluegrassy Wayfaring Strangers, and Bela Fleck asked to learn Greg Liszt's banjo technique.

As great as the lineups were at last weekend's Newport Folk Festival, some of the most memorable moments happened behind the scenes. We asked Jay Sweet , the festival's producer, to list his five favorite things that went down this year. Here's what he e-mailed us: 5. The Freelance Whales at the Lego Duplo KidZone. They performed with the kids from the PS22 Chorus, doing "Generator (First Floor)," the song that made me ask them both to join us this year. I swear I wasn't crying … something poignant just flew in my eye. 4. The entire Middle Brother/Dawes set. From Taylor Goldsmith...

Dec. 2 The Un-Common Theatre Company and Bay Colony Productions present "A Christmas Carol - The Musical" opening at Orpheum Theatre Foxboro. www.brownpapertickets.com Dec. 3 Ryan Landry and the Gold Dust Orphans in "Mrs. Grinchley's Christmas Carol" opens at Machine. www.brownpapertickets.com Tom Rush at the Bull Run Restaurant in Shirley. www.bullrunrestaurant.com Dec. 4 String Cheese Incident at Orpheum Theatre. www.massconcerts.com Dec. 5 and 6 Aurora Borealis 10: A Festival of Light and Dance at Boston University Dance Theater.

After 2009’s “The Hazards of Love,’’ a dense, prog-rock concept album, you wondered where the Decemberists would go next. For their follow-up, they did possibly the only thing that would surprise their fans at this point: They ditched the pretense, reined in the guitars, and made a graceful country record. In a barn, no less. Let’s clarify that: “country’’ as in the pastoral kind Neil Young and Bob Dylan recorded in the 1970s. For every acoustic guitar, there’s just as much pedal steel, tambourine, accordion, organ, and even...

"Good taste" and "Jimmy Buffett" are not usually phrases used in the same sentence. Sure, he's written and performed a gaggle of well-crafted tunes in the singer-songwriter tradition over his nearly 40-year career. But generally speaking, Buffett seems at peace with being the slacker king of margaritas and sunsets whose fans flock to his party-hearty shows to shake off their workday stresses and wriggle into their coconut bras. On his smarter-than-your-average-beach-bum new release, "Take the Weather With You," Buffett reminds everyone -- perhaps even himself -- that...

The big noise in Boston Wednesday night may have been coming from the confines of Fenway Park where Sir Paul McCartney was holding court, but across the street at the House of Blues, the musical friends who comprise the “Big Surprise Tour’’ were making some noise of their own. They served notice that this was going to be no ordinary, self-contained “headliner and supporting acts’’ performance right from the get-go, when everyone involved...

"Best" is such a loaded word, isn't it? Especially when you are talking about the year in music, what does it even mean? Does it refer to the album that far outsold the others? That would be Adele's "21," which appears on critic Sarah Rodman's list. Or is it the record that doubled as your constant soundtrack, from the morning commute to the sonic wallpaper while you cooked dinner? For me, that was PJ Harvey's "Let England Shake. " These are questions the Globe's music critics grapple with when it comes time to survey the past year's array of records, from rock and pop to hip-hop and classical to jazz and...

Dave Rawlings and Gillian Welch apparently had their fill of Legal Sea Foods while in town. The pair, who played two nights at the Wilbur Theatre, told the crowd on the second night they were stuffed with shellfish from Roger Berkowitz 's restaurant. Rawlings, who grew up in Rhode Island, revealed that most of his family was in the audience… . Pats cornerback Kyle Arrington and his agent, Sean Stellato , had dinner at the Kowloon… . PR poobah George Regan hosted a holiday party at his Marina Bay manse and the crowd included a lot of clients,...

POP & ROCK KISS 108 JINGLE BALL 2011 The contemporary hits station throws its annual holiday extravaganza with a variety of acts decking the halls this year, including powerhouse vocalist Kelly Clarkson, party rockers LMFAO, Joe Jonas sans his brothers, Miami rapper Pitbull, Disney darling Demi Lovato, and jovial popsters Cobra Starship. Dec. 8, 7 p.m. Tickets: $42-$177. Tsongas Center. 866-722-8780, www.tsongascenter.com KINGSLEY FLOOD One of the best local bands of the last few years, these Americana enthusiasts celebrate the release...

Dec. 2 The Un-Common Theatre Company and Bay Colony Productions present "A Christmas Carol - The Musical" opening at Orpheum Theatre Foxboro. www.brownpapertickets.com Dec. 3 Ryan Landry and the Gold Dust Orphans in "Mrs. Grinchley's Christmas Carol" opens at Machine. www.brownpapertickets.com Tom Rush at the Bull Run Restaurant in Shirley. www.bullrunrestaurant.com Dec. 4 String Cheese Incident at Orpheum Theatre. www.massconcerts.com Dec. 5 and 6 Aurora Borealis 10: A Festival of Light and Dance at Boston University Dance Theater.

As great as the lineups were at last weekend's Newport Folk Festival, some of the most memorable moments happened behind the scenes. We asked Jay Sweet , the festival's producer, to list his five favorite things that went down this year. Here's what he e-mailed us: 5. The Freelance Whales at the Lego Duplo KidZone. They performed with the kids from the PS22 Chorus, doing "Generator (First Floor)," the song that made me ask them both to join us this year. I swear I wasn't crying … something poignant just flew in my eye. 4. The entire Middle Brother/Dawes set. From Taylor...

As Gillian Welch has promoted her long-awaited new album, “The Harrow & The Harvest,’’ there comes a point early in each interview when a reporter asks her why it took her eight years to deliver it. Every. Single. Time. There’s no good answer, of course. These things occasionally take a while. Welch knows this is not the satisfying, tabloid-flavored answer people are looking for — marriages, divorces, babies! — but it’s the truth. “No one wanted this record out faster than we did,’’ Welch said with a small laugh.

Even Grammy voters don't know what to do with The Civil Wars. The duo has been nominated for best folk album and best country duo/group performance, two categories that bear little resemblance to each other. Fellow nominees run the spectrum from Kenny Chesney to Eddie Vedder to Gillian Welch and Fleet Foxes. And John Paul White and Joy Williams love it. "We kind of had a little bit of a grin between the two of us and our team as well about that, too," Williams said. "I think it's fun the fact that we can't be pigeon-holed into one or the other.