Reply To: 'jewish' songs with non jewish tunes

My Rosh HaYeshiva said that all nigunim are kosher except those associated with non-Jewish religious practice I.E. don’t use the melody from “Silent Night” for L’Cha Dodi. The fact is that most if not all Jewish music, with the exception of the shirei haleviim and, possibly, chazonus, is derivative of the contemporaneous popular music and folk tunes. There is often a problem, however, when the melody of a nigun is immediatly recognizable as a currently popular secular song. Not be cause of an intrinsic issur but because of possibly concentrating on the secular song instead of the new religious message.