Bible Cantillation

Synagogue chanting, more precisely Torah cantillation is the oldest surviving Jewish religious music genre It have been always present throughout the history and the importance of the cantor in Synagogue service dates back to the First Temple Period.

This is a highly specialized task. Some sort of ``notation'' was supposed to be set probably during the middle-ages.

Cantillation is rendered according to special sign which can be seen as a pre-musical-notation form. A special scripting of the Tanakh^3.4 with accents and signs to complement the letters and vowel points is used. These marks are known in English as accents and in Hebrew as ``ta`amei ha-mikra'' or just ``te`amim''. This notation is of Medieval origins. For more details on the cantillations signs see section:, page: and http://www.musicofthebible.com/

Figure: ``te'amim'' Passage of the Tanach with accentuation and markings for the cantillation.

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Some medieval manuscripts of the Mishnah also wear similar signs. This example demonstrate the ``codified'' and specialized nature of the cantillation. Even though this was set probably in the European communities during the middle-ages it can be safely supposed that cantillation has been codified very early in synagogue service.

Three functions are commonly attributed to the cantillation signs:

Syntax

The Torah is written without punctuation marks nor chapter, verses divisions. This function is a convenient syntactic subdivision marker.

Phonetics

The pronunciation is clearly indicated by marking the syllable where the accent falls

Music

Those marks also indicate, to some extend comparable to the earliest plain-chant notation, high-low pitch settings.

It must be kept in mind however that this tradition of cantillation, just like the Muslim Qur'an reading is not considered as ``music'' but as a form of religious service.

Not unlike Gregorian neumes, Masorite editions of the Hebrew text have different symbols attached to the Hebrew letters. One of them is the vowel pointings, as the Hebrew originally does not contain vowels, and the second is the cantillation marks.

Here is a comparative example of the markings:

Figure: Comparative markings for vowels and cantillations

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Vowel pointings are a great help in the correct pronunciation and understanding of the original Hebrew. The meaning of the words can drastically change with the pronunciation.

Figure: Pronunciation changes according to the vowels pointings

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Te'amim, the cantillation marks have two purposes. One is the correct accentuation of the syllables and the second is to provide a ground for proper cantillation.

Usually the vowel pointings and the cantillation marks go together but for the purposes of this short study the examples are given with te'amim only.

There are ten symbols used in the book of Psalms and one sign for the vocal ``shake'' shown far right in the example below:

Figure: All ten te'amim and the vocal shake symbol (far right)

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