Klezmer Music at Gato Rojo

The Harvard bubble can often be claustrophobic, especially when the College is in the thick of midterms. This Thursday, head down to Cafe Gato Rojo and let the Balkan tones and rhythms of Boston-based band Klezwoods take you away.

Klezwoods, an amalgam of strings, horns, and percussion, fuses traditional Eastern-European klezmer music with modern sounds and improvisational jazz. The group's unique style is a result of different musical training: some members play in a reggae style, others are influenced by jazz, and yet others stay very true to classic klezmer sounds. The result is new music with traces of old world melodies.

Though usually a 10-piece band, Klezwoods will be scaling down to an acoustic quintet for this Thursday's show to give an unplugged performance of songs from their most recent album, "The 30th Meridian: From Cairo to St. Petersburg with Love."

The management and staff of Gato Rojo say that they hope to continue hosting bands and small gigs throughout the year. The Cafe has organized similar events in the past, such as open-mic nights and poetry readings, but this semester they plan to make concerts much more regular occurrences.

The event will take place tonight at 8:00 p.m. Cafe Gato Rojo is located in the basement of Lehman Hall in Harvard Yard.