Jewish rock

Jewish rock
Stylistic origins	Contemporary Jewish religious music, rock, folk, klezmer, jam band
Cultural origins	1960s and 1970s in the United States and Israel
Typical instruments	Vocals, guitar, drums, bass, keyboards
Regional scenes
Mevo Modi'im, Yeshiva University, Knitting Factory
Other topics
Jewish music, Israeli rock

Jewish rock is a form of contemporary Jewish religious music that is influenced by various forms of secular rock music. Pioneered by artists like Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach and the Diaspora Yeshiva Band, the genre gained popularity in the 1990s and 2000s with bands like Soulfarm, Blue Fringe, and Moshav Band that appealed to teens and college students, while artists like Matisyahu enjoyed mainstream crossover success.

As early as the 1960s, established Jewish composers like Gershon Kingsley and Cantor Ray Smolover began using contemporary rock and jazz styles in their work. Simultaneously, Shlomo Carlebach, a German-born Hasidic rabbi and songwriter, began his career mixing traditional Jewish songs with the folk music and hippie subculture of the day for kiruv purposes, which would directly influence many Jewish artists over the course of his career.

One of the first full-fledged rock acts in Orthodox music was the Diaspora Yeshiva Band, founded in 1975 by American-born students at the Diaspora Yeshiva in Jerusalem, which had been founded by a colleague of Carlebach's. The founding lineup featured Avraham Rosenblum on guitar, Ben Zion Solomon on fiddle and banjo, Simcha Abramson on saxophone and clarinet, Ruby Harris on violin, mandolin, guitar, and harmonica, Adam Wexler on bass, and Gedalia Goldstein on drums. They played rock and bluegrass music with Jewish-themed lyrics, with the group self-describing its style as "Hasidic rock" and "Country and Eastern".

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Wikipedia