Multicultural Harmony

World music, courtesy of dedicated performers from the area, has been making its way into the Skirball Cultural Center at a steady pace recently.

The concerts provide a hearty alternative to the musical mainstream. The trend continues Tuesday with a program called “Music from the Jewish Diaspora and the Balkans,” featuring two groups from the area--Jewish music specialists Ahava and the band known as the Toids, playing music from the Balkans.

Not coincidentally, both groups grew out of the multiculturally inclined music department at the California Institute of the Arts--the co-sponsor of the concert--where jazz, classical and world music converge.

Just ask Ahava’s founder, Marc Lowenstein, who teaches music theory and composition at CalArts and maintains an active creative life on his own.

Lowenstein, who sings opera, plays clarinet and composes, founded Ahava--Hebrew for “love”--a year ago.

“I’ve felt an itch to do a group like this for quite a long time,” he said. “There’s a happy convergence of people here at CalArts who are very open, stylistically, who play a lot of different styles of music.”

Joining him are bassist Mark Vanderpool, percussionist Randy Gloss, accordionist Julian Hintz, saxophonist Jonathan Moritz and Ryan Francesconi on fret boards. Together, they cook up new variations on Jewish themes from all over Europe, the Middle East and beyond.

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Lowenstein says he believes musicians should discover their musical roots for themselves.

“I insist that my composition students try to do that,” he said. “Roots can mean different things. For one, it means what you heard when you were growing up, before you had any chance to discern what was good and what was bad.”

Ahava’s repertoire is vast in its sources, but personal in its treatment of those sources. Lowenstein recognizes the process of adopting folk songs to personal creative ends is a long-standing tradition in classical music.

One key difference is the easy availability of music of all types in the information age.

“There’s a tremendous availability suddenly of obscure things that are now being re-released,” Lowenstein said. “Bartok had to scramble around North Africa and the Balkans with a pencil and paper and Dictaphone. We go online, we go to Amazon.com, and other people have done that for us.”

Although the general milieu of their material is folk music, that description is a loose one, more a starting point than an end.

“For me, one reason I love folk music so much is that the tunes are so simple, it allows you to see the performer as a human being,” Lowenstein said. “I really think folk music has a simplicity that allows you to see through the music.”

BE THERE

Ahava and the Toids perform Tuesday at 8 p.m. at the Skirball Cultural Center, 2701 Sepulveda Blvd., Los Angeles. Tickets: $12 general admission, $10 for Skirball members, $8 for students. (323) 655-8587.