The Orthodox religious music in Transylvanian tradition has a unique history. It gained an important place in the Romanian musical heritage, by the way it managed to adapt to Romanian, in its own style, the psaltic musical repertoire, of Byzantine tradition. Build from the oral tradition, which, in its turn blended with folklore, cult music, and the other co-existing cults, and from psaltic tradition, Dimitrie Cuntanu’s work fairly represents, the first Transylvanian religious musical monument of Romanian root. The Byzantine musical origin of this paper can be detected, together with other works, from the musical structures of the first Katavasia established by Cuntanu, at Lord’s Birth Feast. Transformed to Romanian by different anonymous protagonists of the Transylvanian music, the Lord’s Birth Catavasia represents a Hrysantic exegesis reference of Byzantine music, in a Transylvanian style.

Keywords: Catavasia, Byzantine music, Anton Pann, Cuntanu, Romanian adaptation