Re: ¿origins of klezmer tonality?

[Bob Jacobson <bjacobs...>]

Cantor Neil Schwartz writes:
>
> Also, your concept of using the lowered seventh as a "dominant" is OK,
>but the chord would be in Major; to use your above example of D Freygish,
>the "dominant" would be C Major, not c minor.  Isador Freed wrote a book
>many years ago called "Harmonizing the Jewish Modes" which deals with
>the very difficult task of harmonizing Ahava Rabba.
>


I'm not a cantor and I'm not familiar with Isador Freed's book, but I think
if you listen to just about any klezmer in D Freygish that uses the lowered
seventh as a dominant, you will hear a c minor, not a C Major. This is true
in just about every case I can think of, and should not be surprising given
that starting a Freygish scale on the minor seventh gives you a Mi
Sheberach scale, which is, as Cantor Schwartz correctly noted elsewhere in
his posting, minor.

Bob Jacobson