Jazz is back in Thame thanks to the efforts of Eddie Fowler who has managed to sort out a new venue and a remarkable line-up for a special December gig. The outstanding young seven-string guitarist Jo Caleb teams up with great saxophonist Stan Sulzmann, Phil Donkin on bass and the renown drummer and composer Seb Rochford. This exceptional gig is on Wednesday and the new venue is Thame Snooker Club, St Andrews Court, Wellington St, Thame. See www.jazzeddie.f2s.com for more details.

Also on Wednesday, Oxford Improvisers have the last of their monthly gigs at the Port Mahon in St Clements. Presented by Miles Doubleday's extraordinary Nonstop Tango, this will be a Christmas Mystery Extravaganza, "a snowblind sleighride of consumer excess and sensory overload featuring friends from Oxford Improvisers and the Spontaneous Art Collective". The Port Mahon may not be Oxford's prime venue but Oxford Improvisers have put on some highly inventive and successful events this year already.

On Thursday, the Spin (at the Wheatsheaf pub off Oxford's High Street) also have their last concert of the season with solo guest the bop and post-bop saxophonist Alex Garnett who is now considered to be one of the young lions of the London jazz world. Best known for his work with Ray Gelato's Giants of Jazz, Alex is one of the frontline of Grooveyard which played a storming gig at the Spin earlier in the year. A reminder that today the Julia Farino quartet, plus Alan Barnes, are at the Carswell Golf and Country Club, near Faringdon - a special Christmas dinner is also available. Meanwhile, at the end of the week on Friday, there is a special return visit by vocalist Sheila Salway and her Amorous Jazz at the Magdalen Arms on Iffley Road.

The season of gigs organised by the F-IRE collective continues at the Vortex, in London, throughout the week. For example, electronic improvisers Stefan Werni and Christian Jendreiko meet the London-based group Freefall playing work inspired by Stockhausen and compositions by Tom Arthurs and others from the F-IRE collective.