Top 5 niggunim of all time?
That is a very good question! Unfortunately, I have to say that I'm not really a Niggumim expert. I'm not really a very musical person. So I'm going to, instead of ranking Niggumim by quality, list here my favourite 5 Niggunim. Hope you don't mind. I'm not claiming they're the best Niggunim ever - especially since I don't know every Niggun that ever existed - but those will be the ones I like.
Secondly, I have to wonder: what amounts to a Niggun? The literal meaning of the word is "a tune" or "a melody". However, does that include tunes and melodies composed for specific words? Or just the wordless Hasidic Niggunim of the last two centuries? If we go with the latter - which would exclude most melodies of Piyutim - we will find ourselves excluding Hassidic tunes composed to music, such as "Kol Dodi" and "E-li Atah V(e)’Odeka", some of the Alter Rebbe's famous Niggunim. An alternative would be to limit us to Hasidic melodies only, but considering how heavy with Chabad my background is we'll end up with too much of their stuff. So I reserve the right to enter some non-Hassidic melodies as well, for balance.
My number one is actually a Breslov Niggun: Niggun Sipurei Ma‘asiot. I was only once or twice in a Breslov synagogue where it was sung in the context that gave it its name, but I've heard it often enough in other contexts. The context that gave it its name would be before telling one of Rabbi Nachman's stories. I feel that this Niggun is very appropriate for that, and it gives me the feeling of fantasy, where everything is possible. Link to Spotify:
Second would be Shamil. It might be nostalgia talking, as I remember it positively from my time in my highschool-Yeshivah, but it's also a Niggun all about longing, which is clearly felt in it. The Niggun was added to the Chabad repertoire by the last Rebbe during Simchat Torah 5719. According to the Rebbe, this Niggun was actually composed by the Imam Shamil, a leader of an uprising against the Russian Empire in the North Caucasus. The story goes that the Russian misled him into accepting a deal and then imprisoned him far from his home in the mountains. And during his imprisonment, he looked through the windows at the skies and longed and hoped to go back to the open, and this Niggun was his way of expressing that. Whether or not the Niggun really comes from him, that's still a powerful story to remember while singing it - and channeling this longing in other directions, the longing of the soul back to G-d (because it's still Chabad). Spotify link:
At this point I admit I have a problem, because I do know that most Niggunim I can remember are more Chabad stuff, or might keep representing the longing angle, which really is strong. Bur I can't just stop here for no reason. I only gave two Niggunim. Well, let's see what more I can bring.
Putting Niggun HaHistalkut here, because I think it's touching. I thought I remembered the story attached but now I'm not so certain, and don't really have the time to verify it against my more Niggun-expert friends. Anyway, presented here:
Here I start cheating and using melodies with words. This is one tune that I rather like of Mizmor Shir L(e)Yom HaShabbat. Admittedly, a large part of why I like it is just because it continues beyond where most Niggunim stop. Attached here will be what I think might be the original performance of this tune, because I don't really know if it has a name of ita own and that's how I managed finding the right one:
Look. I realize at this point saying I'm cheating again can feel like I'm cheating a bit too much. But I feel like I can't make such a list without including anything from Modzhitz, only I barely know anything of theirs... That is, outside of their Shoshanat Ya‘akov, which is admittedly nice but I don't want it here - and the one Niggun of theirs everyone knows, whether or not they know that they know it: the Modzhitz Ani Ma’amin. The story is famous, really: a Jewish Hassidic composer, rabbi ‘Azriel David Pastag, started singing it on the train to Treblinka, with everyone on the train joining him. After he finished singing, he said thar he promises half his part in the world to come to anyone who would manage to get this melody to his Rebbe, the Rabbi of Modzhitz. Two Jews jumped off the train, but only one of them survived and managed to send the tune to the Rebbe. You know this tune and its story, even if you didn't know it was specifically connected to.the Modzhitz Hassidut. This song was sung on the way to the extermination camps, and it's said that with this melody we shall accept the Mashiach. Link to the Modzhitz performance of it:
An honourable mention goes to one of my favourite songs, Ahallelah E-lohai. Can't say there's a particular story here, I just like this song. Here it is:
