[https://youtu.be/qBTtSFoBdXQ](https://youtu.be/qBTtSFoBdXQ)# What a New York Adon Olam Would Sound Like in LondonOne of the most familiar Sephardi melodies for the piyyut Yigdal Elohim Chai, and a mainstay of the London tradition, is curiously absent from the musical canon of New York’s Spanish and Portuguese Sephardi community. However, a variant of this melody, exhibiting some micro-divergences, does appear in the community’s repertoire as a setting for Adon Olam. How the nuanced differences between the two locales came about remains an open question, but serves as an example of the way melodies can shift both tonally and contextually among related communities. The recording presented here begins with the opening couplet as heard in New York and concludes with the final strophe as it might be sung in London using the traditional Yigdal setting. Notes for Nerds Perhaps the most noticeable difference between the two styles is that in the traditional version each couplet’s first line comes to rest on what is grandly described as the supertonic (second note of the scale) while in the New York variant, that pause shifts to the sub-dominant (fourth note). Just a small move but, for a nerd, it can be a story to dine out on.Don’t forget to like, comment, and subscribe for more music from the Spanish and Portuguese Sephardi tradition. Headphones recommended for full polyphonic texture.