Listening to a wicked singer is spiritually dangerous. Listening to a righteous singer can transform your soul. Rabbi Nachman of Breslov explains why, and the answer involves the secret origin of music itself.
The human voice of song, Rabbi Nachman teaches, is drawn from the birds. The Midrash (rabbinic interpretive commentary) asks: why does the Torah prescribe two live birds for the purification of a leper? "Let the chatterer come and atone for the chatterer" (Vayikra Rabbah 16:7). The leper was stricken because of his destructive speech, and birds, creatures of voice, provide the remedy.
The Zohar reveals that the two pure birds "nurse from the same place that the prophets nurse" (Zohar III:53b). This is why a prayer leader is called a chazan (חזן), from the word chazon (חזון), "prophetic vision." A righteous singer draws their melody from the same divine source as prophecy itself. But a wicked singer takes their song from the birds of the kelipah (קליפה), the forces of impurity, and anyone who listens becomes ensnared: "As birds are caught in a trap, so are the children of man ensnared" (Ecclesiastes 9:12).
The remedy is studying the Oral Torah at night. The Talmud is associated with night and darkness: "He seated me in dark places, this is the Babylonian Talmud" (Sanhedrin 24a). By studying the six orders of the Mishnah, a person rectifies the six rings of the windpipe through which the voice emerges. "Rise, sing out in the night" (Lamentations 2:19). Song is purified and elevated through Torah study in the darkness.
Joy is the result. When the voice is rectified, wisdom flows. "A person's wisdom causes his countenance to shine" (Ecclesiastes 8:1). And joy, genuine joy rooted in holy song and Torah, opens gates of understanding that no amount of somber study can unlock.