Midweek Music Preview: Charity jams, Chinese folk music, and Senegalese beats

Shanghaiist lists all the live music performances you might want to check out from now to Sunday this week. For fun things that aren't live music, take a peek at our Pencil This In (out every Monday!)

Things are slowly picking up after the end of the JUE Festival, but it still feels like a pretty slow live music scene this week. The highlight, for us, is Thursday's fundraiser at Kaiba - head on over to that Belgian beer garden for a night with Break for Borneo, amongst other acts. And the best thing - it's in support of The Library Project's efforts to build at least one new library in Anhui. Let's see whether we can make it more.

Elsewhere, the music scene is taking a delightfully African-influenced turn this week, with performances by Senegalese percussionist Latyr Sy, and Shanghai's Afro-Beat Orchestra playing sounds from that great continent. Other cultural melodies in store are from Chinese folk musician Zhang Quan.

WEDNESDAY

South Carolina pop punk band Eleventyseven swing by China before heading to Japan's Punk Spring festival. They'll be playing at Yuyintang tonight; if, like us, you hadn't heard of them before this, swing by their MySpace page and give them a try.
7:30 PM, Yuyintang, 1731 Yan'an Xi Lu, Changning, entrance at Kaixuan Lu, 延安西路1731号, 入口在凯旋路.

THURSDAY

We've mentioned it in Pencil This In, but this is worth repeating: Kaiba is hosting 'Inspired Living, Inspiring Lives', a live music charity event to raise money and collect books for at least one new library in Anhui, run by The Library Project, a great NGO that donates books and libraries to under-financed schools and orphanages in China and the developing world. Tonight features live music from Break for Borneo, Kate Lewis & Friends, Dantès Dailiang, and Ulys. Entry is either with the donation of three Chinese-language children's books (from kindergarten level to age six), or RMB 40 if you come without books. Either way, you get a free beers, and all proceeds from ticket sales goes towards The Library Project.
7 PM, Kaiba (The Belgian Beer Garden), 739 Dingxi Lu, south of Yan'an Xi Lu, 定西路739号, 近延安西路.

Chinese folk musician and painter Zhang Quan (张佺) performs at Yuyintang tonight. Zhang spent his childhood in rural Gansu and Qinghai listening to the popular folk music of Northwest China, and has released two recordings of his live shows around the country. He'll be entertaining us with a Chinese instrument called dongbu la, and the harmonica.
9 PM, Yuyintang, 1731 Yan'an Xi Lu, Changning, entrance at Kaixuan Lu, 延安西路1731号, 入口在凯旋路.