<i>Eastern Elements in Western Chant</i>: a second look over a changed landscape

ABSTRACT Egon Wellesz’s Eastern Elements in Western Chant (1947, repr. 1967) is outdated but topical in that the resemblances he adduced between Eastern and Western chant continue to invite explanations. An assessment of his book and research since then on the topics of simple vs. complex melody, melodic resemblance, historical frameworks, musical communities and Semitic antecedents of Christian chant lead to the conclusion that the comparative study of medieval Christian chant repertories and of Jewish melodies from post-medieval sources cannot be shaped by simplistic assumptions, such as that simpler melodies are earlier or more primitive than more complicated ones, or that Christian practices must have had Jewish origins. Nor can melodies that resemble each other be assumed to be historically related. Studies of oral traditions show that what is transmitted is often a more abstract contour that can be realised in more than one way. Most importantly, no music can be studied apart from the community that makes or made it, and musical evidence must be interpreted within a framework of verifiable historical fact, especially when contacts between different communities are alleged.