There will be no shortage of major talent coming to the area next year.

From classic country to Seattle grunge, no musical stone is left unturned.Here are just a few of the highlights.Penn's PeakPenn's Peak in Jim Thorpe is already filling its calendar for the new year.On Jan. 22 Umphey's McGee returns. After 18-plus years of performing more than 100 concerts annually, releasing nine studio albums and selling more than 4.2 million tracks online, this jam band might be forgiven if they chose to rest on their laurels. But then that wouldn't be consistent with the work ethic demonstrated by the members, who consistently attempt to raise the bar, setting and achieving new goals since forming in 1997.On Feb. 10, 38 Special returns with its signature blast of southern rock. The band's many gold and platinum album awards stand in testament to the endurance of a legendary powerhouse.Get ready to rock out on Feb. 28 with ZZ Top. After more than 45 years of playing rock, blues and boogie on the road and in the studio, Billy F. Gibbons, Dusty Hill and Frank Beard are still going strong."Yeah," says Gibbons, guitarist extraordinaire, "we're the same three guys, bashing out the same three chords."March 11 it's Dennis DeYoung, founding member of Styx and the lead singer and writer on seven of the band's eight Top 10 hits. His live concert with his six-piece band showcases all the Styx greatest hits.A legendary singer, songwriter, keyboardist, composer and record producer with a career spanning over 40 years, DeYoung's voice is one of the most recognizable in the music world.The Zombies return to the Peak on March 18 as they celebrate the golden anniversary of the album "Odessey and Oracle," one of the classic pop albums of all time.The tour reunites all four surviving members of the group, Colin Blunstone on lead vocals, Rod Argent on keyboards/vocals, Chris White on bass/vocals, and Hugh Grundy on drums, as well as bassist Jim Rodford, guitarist Tom Toomey and Steve Rodford on drums.May 12 the Coal Miner's Daughter, Loretta Lynn, returns to Penn's Peak. Lynn's instantly recognizable delivery is one of the greatest voices in music history, and no songwriter has a more distinctive body of work.Lynn is also one of the most awarded musicians of all time. She has been inducted into more music Halls of Fame than any female recording artist, including The Country Music Hall of Fame and the Songwriters Hall of Fame, and was the first woman to be named the Country Music Association's Entertainer of the Year.Lynn received Kennedy Center Honors in 2003 and a Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2013. She has won four Grammy Awards (including a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2010) and sold more than 45 million records worldwide.For more information on any of the shows coming up at Penn's Peak, visit

www.pennspeak.com.Mauch Chunk Opera HouseThe Mauch Chunk Opera House in Jim Thorpe will be welcoming some big names as well.On Jan. 14 it's Loudon Wainwright III. Wainwright has had an illustrious career, highlighted by more than two dozen album releases, a 2010 Grammy for Best Traditional Folk Album for "High Wide & Handsome: The Charlie Poole Project" and two Grammy nominations for "I'm Alright" and "More Love Songs."Wainwright is perhaps best known for the novelty song "Dead Skunk (in the Middle of the Road)," and for playing Capt. Calvin Spalding, the "singing surgeon," on the television show, M*A*S*H. His songs have been recorded by Bonnie Raitt, Johnny Cash, Earl Scruggs, Kate & Anna McGarrigle, Rufus Wainwright and Mose Allison.Steve Forbert returns to the opera house on Feb. 4. As a young man from Meridian, Mississippi, Forbert traveled to New York City and played guitar for spare change in Grand Central Station. He vaulted to international prominence with a folk-rock hit, "Romeo's Tune," during a time when rootsy rock was fading out and the Ramones, Talking Heads and other New Wave and punk acts were moving in to the public consciousness.Still, critics raved about his poetic lyrics and engaging melodies, and the crowds at CBGB's club in New York accepted him alongside those acts."I've never been interested in changing what I do to fit emerging trends," Forbert says. "Looking back on it, I was helping to keep a particular American songwriting tradition alive at a time when it wasn't in the spotlight."For more information, visit

http://mcohjt.com.The Sherman TheaterThe Sherman Theater in Stroudsburg welcomes Beth Hart on March 2. The Blues Magazine once dubbed Hart "the ultimate female rock star," and there's no doubt that her two-decade career is the ultimate thrill-ride.Born in Los Angeles, she released a fistful of hit albums through the '90s, then reignited in the post-millennium as both a solo artist and the head-turning vocalist for guitar heroes like Joe Bonamassa, Jeff Beck and Slash.On March 10, Candlebox, the influential, multiplatinum rock band from the powerful '90s Seattle music movement, will be bringing an intimate acoustic duo performance to The Sherman. The band returned with its long-overdue sixth album "Disappearing in Airports" on April 22 of this year. This album showcases the group's introspective and poetically candid songwriting with their signature musical immediacy.On April 18 it's Ben Folds, one of the major music influencers of this generation. Throughout his career, Folds has created an enormous body of genre-bending musical art that includes pop albums as the frontman for Ben Folds Five, multiple solo rock albums, as well as unique collaborative records with artists from Sara Bareilles to Weird Al.For more information, visit

http://www.shermantheater.com.