Start the December holidays off right with New Haven's gift of jazz, a beautiful spiritual style that draws on diverse musical and cultural histories to give us all the warm feels. Featuring Christmas classics, selections from Vince Guaraldi's "A Charlie Brown Christmas," jazz standards, and more.

This Christmas concert will be held on Friday, December 4, at 7 p.m. in the St. PJ's Episcopal Church sanctuary, with the entrance on Chapel Street just off Olive Street.

Tickets $25; children 12 and under are free. Available online or at the door. Street parking only.

Make it a double feature: The annual Wooster Square tree lighting is also scheduled for Friday, December 4, just down the block -- you can attend the lighting and then make your way to St. PJ's just in time!

Read about the St. PJ's Jazz Collective in the New Haven Independent's "Gospel According to Jazz" >>

Collective director Dylan Rowland, piano, is an instructor at the Macri School Of Music and the music director at St. PJ's. Dylan is a graduate of The Hartt School, the comprehensive performing arts conservatory of the University of Hartford, as well as the Greater Hartford Academy of the Arts. He has played with such renowned musicians as the Great Delfeayo Marsalis and the Uptown Jazz Orchestra, the irresistible tap dance and live music company "Music From The Sole" at Guggenheim New York, and more.

The Christmas Kickoff Concert

With the St. PJ's Jazz Collective, feat. Dylan Rowland