On this topic, there is only one form of authentic Jewish music, nusach, which is based upon the trope systems used in reading from the Torah, the Prophets and the Megillot. But even that music, which is essentially the pentatonic major and minor scales, from its literal inception in the First Temple era assumed the structure of the prevailing music of the day, the Greek tetrachords. Indeed Jews modified those tetrachord patterns to fit the pentatonic nature of their music. But trope and it’s extension, nusach are the only true Jewish forms of music. Leib Glantz demonstrated how the ever ubiquitous “freigish” nusach, or Ahava Rabah, as it is technically termed, is in fact one the most recent additions to our musical system probably coming from the near east well after the destruction of the Second Commonwealth. But since we’ve so completely incorporated it, it is definitively Jewish. Even Nusach and also chazzanut, the natural development of nusach, has been subject to secular influences over time. The pentaonic scales and the tetrachords of old became subject to major and minor systems of scale structure. The sonata, the minuet, the waltz, even the fugue, have been incorporated into our sacred music. Sadly, oh so sadly, even rock and roll and cheesy folk music styles are now heard in our schuls. But it’s silly for anyone to ever believe that there has been no outside influence on our musical heritage. the trick is in knowing what’s hitorically Jewish, and what isn’t.
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