''Pizmonim'' (

Hebrew Hebrew (; ''ʿÎbrit'') is a Northwest Semitic languages, Northwest Semitic language within the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family. A regional dialect of the Canaanite languages, it was natively spoken by the Israelites and ...

פזמונים, singular ''pizmon'') are traditional

Jewish Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, rel ...

songs and melodies sung with the intention of praising God as well as learning certain aspects of traditional religious teachings. They are sung throughout religious rituals and festivities such as prayers,

circumcision Circumcision is a procedure that removes the foreskin from the human penis. In the most common form of the operation, the foreskin is extended with forceps, then a circumcision device may be placed, after which the foreskin is excised. T ...

s, ''

bar mitzvah A ''bar mitzvah'' () or ''bat mitzvah'' () is a coming of age ritual in Judaism. According to Halakha, Jewish law, before children reach a certain age, the parents are responsible for their child's actions. Once Jewish children reach that age ...

s'', weddings and other ceremonies. ''Pizmonim'' are extra-liturgical, as distinct from ''

piyyut A piyyuṭ (plural piyyuṭim, ; from ) is a Jewish liturgical poem, usually designated to be sung, chanted, or recited during religious services. Most piyyuṭim are in Mishnaic Hebrew or Jewish Palestinian Aramaic, and most follow some p ...

im'', which are hymns printed in the

prayer-book A prayer book is a book containing prayers and perhaps devotional readings, for private or communal use, or in some cases, outlining the liturgy of religious services. Books containing mainly orders of religious services, or readings for them are ...

and forming an integral part of the

service Service may refer to: Activities * Administrative service, a required part of the workload of university faculty * Civil service, the body of employees of a government * Community service, volunteer service for the benefit of a community or a ...

. Similar songs sung in the

synagogue A synagogue, also called a shul or a temple, is a place of worship for Jews and Samaritans. It is a place for prayer (the main sanctuary and sometimes smaller chapels) where Jews attend religious services or special ceremonies such as wed ...

on the

Sabbath In Abrahamic religions, the Sabbath () or Shabbat (from Hebrew ) is a day set aside for rest and worship. According to the Book of Exodus, the Sabbath is a day of rest on the seventh day, Ten Commandments, commanded by God to be kept as a Holid ...

morning between midnight and dawn are called ''

baqashot The ''baqashot'' (or ''bakashot'', ) are a collection of supplications, songs, and prayers that have been sung by the Sephardic Syrian, Moroccan, and Turkish Jewish communities for centuries each week on Shabbat mornings from the early hours of t ...

'' (שירת הבקשות).

Geographical background

''Pizmonim'' are traditionally associated with

Sephardi Jews Sephardic Jews, also known as Sephardi Jews or Sephardim, and rarely as Iberian Peninsular Jews, are a Jewish diaspora population associated with the historic Jewish communities of the Iberian Peninsula (Spain and Portugal) and their descendant ...

, although they are related to

Ashkenazi Jews Ashkenazi Jews ( ; also known as Ashkenazic Jews or Ashkenazim) form a distinct subgroup of the Jewish diaspora, that emerged in the Holy Roman Empire around the end of the first millennium CE. They traditionally speak Yiddish, a language ...

' ''

zemirot Zemirot or Z'miros ( ''zǝmîrôt'', singular: zimrah but often called by the masculine zemer) are Jewish hymns, usually sung in the Hebrew or Aramaic languages, but sometimes also in Yiddish or Ladino during Shabbat and to some extent the Jewis ...

''. The best known tradition is associated with Jews descended from

Aleppo Aleppo is a city in Syria, which serves as the capital of the Aleppo Governorate, the most populous Governorates of Syria, governorate of Syria. With an estimated population of 2,098,000 residents it is Syria's largest city by urban area, and ...

, though similar traditions exist among

Iraqi Jews The history of the Jews in Iraq (, ', ; , ) is documented from the time of the Babylonian captivity . Iraqi Jews constitute one of the world's oldest and most historically significant Jewish communities. The Jewish community in Mesopotamia, kn ...

(where the songs are known as ''shbaḥoth'', praises) and in

North Africa North Africa (sometimes Northern Africa) is a region encompassing the northern portion of the African continent. There is no singularly accepted scope for the region. However, it is sometimes defined as stretching from the Atlantic shores of t ...

n countries. Jews of

Greek Greek may refer to: Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor of all kno ...

, Turkish and Balkan origin have songs of the same kind in Ladino, associated with the festivals: these are known as ''coplas''.

History of texts

The texts of many ''pizmonim'' date back to before the

Middle Ages In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the 5th to the late 15th centuries, similarly to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire and ...

, while others were composed by poets such as Yehuda Halevi and Israel Najara of Gaza after the Spanish Inquisition. Some melodies are quite old, while others may be based on popular

Middle Eastern music The various nations of the region include the Arabic-speaking countries of the Middle East, the Iranian traditions of Persia, the Jewish music of Israel and the diaspora, Kurdish music, Armenian music. Azeri Music, the varied traditions of Cyp ...

, with the words composed specially to fit the tune. A prolific composer of ''pizmonim'' of this last kind was Hakham Rephael Antebi Tabbush (Aleppo 1830According to the biography i
www.piyut.il
and the preface to ''Shirah Ḥadashah'' ("the Blue Book"). ''La-qedoshim asher ba-are"tz'' gives the date as 1856/7.-Cairo 1918), who is regarded as the founder of the tradition in its present form. The tradition has since been exported to Syrian Jewish communities in the Americas by his pupils, principally Hakham Moses Ashear in New York. ''Pizmonim'' are composed for special occasions such as weddings and ''bar mitzvahs'' by Cantors in the past, as well as the present, by Ezekiel Hai Albeg, H Ezra Mishaniye, Rabbi Raphael Yair Elnadav, and others. Most ''pizmonim'' are in Hebrew, though a few are in Judaeo-Aramaic or Judaeo-Arabic.

''Maqamat'' (''maqams'')

All ''pizmonim'' can be classified under different ''

maqam Maqam, makam, maqaam or maqām (plural maqāmāt) may refer to: Musical structures * Arabic maqam, melodic modes in traditional Arabic music ** Iraqi maqam, a genre of Arabic maqam music found in Iraq * Persian maqam, a notion in Persian clas ...

s'' (musical modes), of which there are about ten in common use. '' Maqam ajam'', which sounds a little like a Western

major scale The major scale (or Ionian mode) is one of the most commonly used musical scales, especially in Western music. It is one of the diatonic scales. Like many musical scales, it is made up of seven notes: the eighth duplicates the first at doubl ...

, is the thematic ''maqam'' that contains many holiday melodies. ''Maqam hijaz'', which corresponds to the

Phrygian dominant scale In music, the Phrygian dominant scale (or the Phrygian ♮3 scale) is the actual fifth musical mode, mode of the harmonic minor scale, the fifth being the dominant (music), dominant.Dave Hunter (2005). ''Play Acoustic'', San Francisco: Backbeat, p ...

, is the thematic ''maqam'' that contains many sad melodies. ''Maqam sikah'' (or ''sigah''), containing many three-quarter-tone intervals, is used for the cantillation of the Torah. ''Maqam saba'' is the ''maqam'' used for circumcisions.

Origins of tradition

The origin of the tradition could potentially be explained in the context of certain rulings of the ''

Geonim ''Geonim'' (; ; also Romanization of Hebrew, transliterated Gaonim, singular Gaon) were the presidents of the two great Talmudic Academies in Babylonia, Babylonian Talmudic Academies of Sura Academy , Sura and Pumbedita Academy , Pumbedita, in t ...

'' discouraging the use of ''

im'' in core parts of the prayer service. These rulings were taken seriously by the

Kabbalistic Kabbalah or Qabalah ( ; , ; ) is an esoteric method, discipline and school of thought in Jewish mysticism. It forms the foundation of mystical religious interpretations within Judaism. A traditional Kabbalist is called a Mekubbal (). Jewi ...

school of

Isaac Luria Isaac ben Solomon Ashkenazi Luria (; #FINE_2003, Fine 2003, p24/ref>July 25, 1572), commonly known in Jewish religious circles as Ha'ari, Ha'ari Hakadosh or Arizal, was a leading rabbi and Jewish mysticism, Jewish mystic in the community of Saf ...

, and from the sixteenth century on many hymns were eliminated from the service. As the community did not wish to lose these much-loved hymns, the custom grew up of singing them extra-liturgically. Thus, the original core of the ''pizmonim'' collection consists of hymns from the old Aleppo ritual (published in Venice in 1560) and hymns from the

Sephardic Sephardic Jews, also known as Sephardi Jews or Sephardim, and rarely as Iberian Peninsular Jews, are a Jewish diaspora population associated with the historic Jewish communities of the Iberian Peninsula (Spain and Portugal) and their descendant ...

service by Yehuda Halevi,

Solomon ibn Gabirol Solomon ibn Gabirol or Solomon ben Judah (, ; , ) was an 11th-century Jews, Jewish poet and Jewish philosopher, philosopher in the Neoplatonism, Neo-Platonic tradition in Al-Andalus. He published over a hundred poems, as well as works of biblical ...

and others. A few hymns were also taken from the liturgy of the Romaniotes. Further ''pizmonim'' were composed and added to the collection through the centuries. This practice may have arisen out of a Jewish prohibition of singing songs of the non-Jews (due to the secular character and lyrics of the songs). This was true in the case of

Arabic Arabic (, , or , ) is a Central Semitic languages, Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) assigns lang ...

songs, whereby Jews were allowed to listen to the songs, but not allowed to sing them with the text. In order to bypass the problem, many composers, throughout the centuries, wrote new lyrics to the songs with the existing melodies, in order not to violate the tradition of not singing non-Jewish songs.

Liturgical and non-liturgical use

During typical Shabbat and holiday services in the Syrian tradition, the melodies of ''pizmonim'' are used as settings for some of the prayers, in a system of rotation to ensure that the maqam suits the mood of the holiday or the Torah reading. Each week there is a different ''

'' assigned to the cantor according to the theme of the given Torah portion of the week. A ''pizmon'' may also be sung in honour of a person called up to the Torah, immediately before or after the reading: usually this is chosen so as to contain some allusion to the person's name or family. ''Pizmonim'', or any melodies, are generally not applied throughout the week during prayer services. Another occasion for their use is at the gatherings some individuals would hold in their homes on Shabbat afternoons. A gathering of this kind may take the form of an extended

kiddush Kiddush (; ), , is a blessing recited over wine or grape juice to sanctify the Shabbat and Jewish holidays. Additionally, the word refers to a small repast held on Shabbat or festival mornings after the prayer services and before the meal. S ...

, and is known as a ''sebbet'' (from the Syrian Arabic for "Saturday").

The Red book

In 1959, the Syrian community of Brooklyn, New York, acted on the need of compiling their own pizmonim book based on their ancient traditions from Aleppo. Prior to this, there were many older pizmonim books circulating around the community, but they didn't have Hebrew vowels, and were generally difficult for the masses to utilize. The book, which was published by the Sephardic Heritage Foundation, was started in 1949 by Gabriel Shrem and was completed in 1964. It aimed to include the ancient (Baqashot and Petihot), the old (Israel Najara, Mordechai Abadi, Raphael Tabbush, Moshe Ashear), and the new material (Raphael Yair Elnadav, Ezra Dweck, Gabriel A Shrem, Ezekiel Hai Albeg, Abraham Cohen Saban, Ezra Mishaniye, and other modern Israeli melodies). The book also has innovative features very useful for a cantor, such as a list of maqams to go with the specific perasha, as well as which pieces of Sabbath prayers fit with the melodies of certain pizmonim. In later editions, more songs were added to the book in their appropriate sections. The classic red pizmonim book mentioned above serves Syrian Jews of Brooklyn as their official canon of pizmonim. The book is currently in its ninth edition.

Sephardic Pizmonim Project

The Sephardic Pizmonim Project, is a website dedicated to the scholarship, restoration and preservation of the ancient music of the Sephardic-Syrian Jewish community. The project, founded by David Matouk Betesh, is dedicated to the memory of his great-grandfather, cantor Gabriel A Shrem, a former instructor at

Yeshiva University Yeshiva University is a Private university, private Modern Orthodox Judaism, Orthodox Jewish university with four campuses in New York City.

's Cantorial Institute (Philip and Sarah Belz School of Jewish Music), cantor of B'nai Yosef Synagogue and editor-in-chief of the "Shir uShbaha Hallel veZimrah" pizmonim book. The website is also dedicated in honor of cantor Isaac J. Cabasso of Congregation Beth Torah in Brooklyn, New York. Preludes to the project began in the late 1970s when Shrem started teaching a course at Yeshiva University. As a demonstration tool, Shrem recorded the bulk of the pizmonim for classroom distribution. The collection resulting from these recordings encompassed roughly 65% of the Sephardic pizmonim liturgy. Since 2004 and over the course of about seven years, Isaac J. Cabasso, on behalf of the Sephardic Pizmonim Project, has provided approximately 200 more recordings of pizmonim not recorded by Shrem. The Sephardic Pizmonim Project organisation re-released all of Shrem's recordings on a large CD collection in September 2004 selling approximately 7,000 CDs. The organisation launched a website in 2006 with the goal of "preserving all iddle Eastern Jewishliturgical traditions". In the process, cantors throughout the world have contacted the organisation to provide recordings to further enhance the project. The project's website (www.pizmonim.com) contains recordings of the Biblical taamim and the

, together with pizmonim not included in the CD collection. In January 2012, the website, under web designer Sam Franco, received a major facelift to advance the organization into the next decade. In 2020, the project announced that it had reached the benchmark of only missing 65 melodies of pizmonim from the 'Shir Ushbaha Hallel VeZimrah' pizmonim book. When the project first began, they were missing over 300 pizmonim. The last 65 pizmonim that are still missing will be more difficult to obtain due to the aging population and the general difficulty of those specific pizmonim. In addition to preserving "Red Book" pizmonim, the project also attempts to preserve pizmonim from "Old Shir Ushbaha" (Cohen, 1905, 1921) as well as melodies whose names appear in the weekly Hazzanut notes of H Moses Ashear (1877–1940).

Notes

External links

Piyut
(in Hebrew), also contains hymns from other traditions.
Sephardic Pizmonim Project
includes samples of pizmonim from Shir Ushbaִhah Hallel Vezimrah Pizmonim book. Jewish prayer and ritual texts Jewish services Jewish music Judaism in Syria Vocal music Jewish music genres Hebrew words and phrases in Jewish prayers and blessings

Geographical background

History of texts

''Maqamat'' (''maqams'')

Origins of tradition

Liturgical and non-liturgical use

The Red book

Sephardic Pizmonim Project

See also

Notes

Further reading

Books

Secondary literature

External links