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Polyphony (/ p ə ˈ l ɪ f ə n i / pə-LIF-ə-nee) is a type of musical texture consisting of two or more simultaneous lines of independent melody, as opposed to a musical texture with just one voice or a texture with one dominant melodic voice accompanied by chords ().
An intuitively understandable example for a polyphonic instrument is a (classical) piano, on which the player plays different melody lines with the left and the right hand - depending on music style and composition, these may be musically tightly interrelated or may even be totally unrelated to each other, like in parts of Jazz music.
Although in music instruction certain styles or repertoires of music are often identified with one of these descriptions this is basically added music [clarification needed] (for example, Gregorian chant is described as monophonic, Bach Chorales are described as homophonic and fugues as polyphonic), many composers use more than one type of ...
The Novachord is an electronic musical instrument often considered the world's first commercial polyphonic synthesizer. [1] [2] [3] Incorporating many circuit and control elements found in modern synthesizers, and using subtractive synthesis to generate tones, it was designed by John M. Hanert, Laurens Hammond and C. N. Williams, and was manufactured by the Hammond company. [4]
A descant is a form of medieval music in which one singer sang a fixed melody, and others accompanied with improvisations. The word in this sense comes from the term discantus supra librum (descant "above the book"), and is a form of Gregorian chant in which only the melody is notated but an improvised polyphony is understood.
Micropolyphony is easier with larger ensembles or polyphonic instruments such as the piano, [1] though the Poème symphonique for a hundred metronomes creates "micropolyphony of unparallelled complexity". [3] Many of Ligeti's piano pieces are examples of micropolyphony applied to complex "minimalist" Steve Reich and Pygmy music derived rhythmic ...
"Up and Down This World Goes Round", three voice round by Matthew Locke. [1] Play ⓘ. A round (also called a perpetual canon [canon perpetuus], round about or infinite canon) is a musical composition, a limited type of canon, in which multiple voices sing exactly the same melody, but with each voice beginning at different times so that different parts of the melody coincide in the different ...
In European classical music, imitative writing was featured heavily in the highly polyphonic compositions of the Renaissance and Baroque eras.A more improvisatory form of imitation can be found in Arab and Indian vocal music where the instrumentalist may accompany the vocalist in a vocal improvisation with imitation.