DECEMBER is always a busy month at entertainment venues, and the award winning Apex centre at Bury St Edmunds gets the month off to a flying start on December 1 with a packed day of activities.

March Hare Collective are holding their Christmas gift fair, a new art exhibition Interlude opens with a selection of contemporary painting, 3D work and fine art prints; there will be a harmonica workshop by Steve Lockwood; and BBC Suffolk is holding the annual BBC Suffolk Children in Need carol concert.

This is swiftly followed on December 2, with the show R�verie – The Life & Loves of Claude Debussy. Concert pianist Lucy Parham is joined by Brendan Coyle, whole played Mr Bates in BBC’s Downton Abbey, to follow Debussy’s complex intellectual and emotional life, which included an entangled love life, a brush with a revolver and even a suicide attempt. This narrative is punctuated with solo piano works including the much-loved Clair de Lune, Reverie. and The Girl with the Flaxen Hair.

Currently touted as the next big thing, Bastille will be playing on December 7, you may have already heard them on BBC radio and tickets are selling really well for this gig. Though not quite as well as they are for Joe Brown the night before – who has completely sold out!

Doyenne of the English folk scene, Norma Waterson has one of the strongest and truest voices that contemporary folk music has ever produced. She is joined on Monday December 10 by her daughter, singer & fiddle player, Eliza Carthy, winner of numerous BBC folk awards. With their rich, distinctive and authentic voices, mother and daughter have effortlessly engaged new audiences and admirers across two generations.

Maddy Prior and The Carnival Band will present a Christmas show in their own inimitable style on Tuesday December 18. Celebrating the 25th anniversary of their partnership, this unique celebratory show of Christmas music, mixes renaissance, modern and ethnic instruments with a refreshing cavalier attitude and plenty of humour.

The final gig before Christmas, on Saturday December 22, is by the world’s leading Killers tribute act – The Fillers, supported by Kings of Lyon.

Box office: 01284 75800 or see the website - www.theapex.co.uk for more details.