[MissYasuri]

Kansas Music Hall of Fame inductee Kelley Hunt returns to the Cotillion tonight after a 10-month absence. Consider it an early New Year's celebration, if you will. A gifted songwriter, pianist and singer, Hunt promises her "New Year Rising" concert will be full of surprises.

"We'll be looking for all kinds of ways to cause trouble," she joked in a statement.

In previous years, Hunt's New Year's shows have featured a parade of special guests, expanded arrangements, new material and unannounced additions to her regular backing band. Tonight's performance will include preliminary arrangements of tunes from her forthcoming album. "It's sort of a working laboratory for her songs," said Hunt's manager, Al Berman.

Whatever the set list, Hunt will no doubt infuse the material with all of the gospel-R&B-boogie-woogie energy that's earned her a following at blues festivals nationwide. Mixing it up with her band this year is special guest Phil Wiggins, an elite blues harp player from Washington, D.C.