MIT Klez

About Our Group
What is Klezmer Music
Ensemble Members
Upcoming Events

About our group
MIT's klezmer ensemble, MIT Klez, is composed an assortment of undergraduate students, graduate students, and community members who enjoy making music. We learn klezmer musical styles and develop songs for performance.

MIT Klez meets weekly for rehearsal on Sunday evenings. New musicians are welcome. For information contact MIT Klez director Asher Siebert, asherb@mit.edu

What is Klezmer Music:
The Yiddish word, klezmer, a contraction of the Hebrew words k’lei and zemer, meaning instruments of song, referred to itinerant musicians in 17th century Eastern Europe who would play at weddings and other simches (happy occasions), facilitating the exchange of musical traditions as they went. The cymbalom (a relative of the hammered dulcimer) and violin were the earliest klezmer instruments.

Just as the Yiddish language incorporated words from each country where Jews lived in E. Europe, so did klezmer music incorporate themes from many lands. In klezmer music one can hear echoes of synagogue chants, of gypsy music and shepherd tunes from Rumania, of folkdance music from Russia and Ukraine, of Turkish and Arabic rhythms, and of big band/jazz motifs from the New World.
(“What is Klezmer Music” text by Sheldon Benjamin)

Ensemble Members:
Piano: Tin Klanjscek
Drums: Jonathan Blythe
Percussion, Piano: Carol Novitsky
Guitar: Matt Cohen
Violin: Daniel Salomon
Clarinet: Megan Ogilvie
Flute: Jeremy Stein
Trumpet & Director: Asher Siebert

Upcoming Events:
Klezmer Music Jam
Sunday, January 18, 8:00-10:00 p.m., Student Center PDR 1 & 2
MIT's new Klezmer ensemble will be hosting an information/jam session. Klezmer is the music of Ashkenazic Jews and it combines Eastern European folk music with elements of jazz. We will perform an assortment of pieces from different sub-genres of klezmer and will discuss some of the history and evolution of klezmer music in the first hour. The second hour of our session will be a jam session in which any student who wishes can play/sing klezmer tunes along with us. Anyone who wants to join our group (especially if you play bass, trombone or sing) is strongly encouraged to attend.