The Klezmatics to perform on Dec. 13 at Purdue

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. – The Grammy-winning "klezmer" band, The Klezmatics, will perform at 8 p.m. on Dec 13 at Purdue University's Loeb Playhouse. This performance is presented by Purdue Convocations.

"Klezmer" has been a musical cornerstone of Jewish culture for centuries, translated in English as "vessel of song." Those words also define Woody Guthrie, an icon of 20th-century American music whose folk song heritage endures. From the same discovery of unrecorded Guthrie lyrics that yielded Wilco and Billy Bragg's "Mermaid Avenue" sessions comes "Happy Joyous Hanukkah" - an up-tempo series of Guthrie songs about the holiday that have been given contemporary life through newly written music by the Klezmatics.

Guthrie Jewish wrote such songs as "Honeyky Hanukka," "Hanukkah Tree," and "Hanuk's Flame." After these songs were lost to his archives for nearly 30 years, Guthrie's daughter Nora commissioned the Klezmatics to revive these festive "freylekhs" that playfully, but respectively, honor Hanukkah traditions. This will be a celebration of the Festival of Lights and an evening that offers new perspective on how much more there was to the "Dust Bowl troubadour."

Tickets are $28 for adults and $20 for those 18 years and younger, Purdue students and Ivy Tech Lafayette students. Tickets are available at the Stewart Center box office at 765-494-3933, 800-914-SHOW or online through www.convocations.org/tickets.

Initiated in 1902, Purdue Convocations is among the oldest collegiate performing arts presenters in the United States. Convocations brings a diverse array of world-class performances and intellectual encounters to our academic, local, and regional audiences through engaging educational opportunities.

Source: Abby Eddy, Purdue Convocations director of marketing, 765-494-9712, aeeddy@purdue.edu 

Note to Journalists: A publication-quality photograph of The Klezmatics is available at http://www.convocations.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/Klezmatics5_300dpi_rgb.jpg