Vehalleluya (And Hallelujah)

This Hallel is based mainly on two recitation tones, with an interval of a major second between them. The singers go freely from one recitation tone to the other. They also add the two tones below them, so that here, too, the range is a tetrachord for the most part. The melodic pattern consists of musical phrases sung on the recitation tones or close to them. All these phrases end with a fall, and only the last hallelujah ends with an ascending phrase. Singers of different ages sing at whatever pitch they find comfortable, and the result is singing in parallel intervals, like an organum (Bahat, 1995: 284).