Polyphony In Modern Music

What is Polyphony?

Polyphony is the texture of music containing two or more individual lines of melody, rather than one monotonous line of melody. This was brought later into the middle ages after monophony and later developed into homophony. Monophony is the musical texture with only one voice, Polyphony is the musical texture containing 2 or more individual melodies played simultaneously and Homophony is the musical texture of the melody accompanies with chords.

Figure 1.1- Polyphony Figure 1.2- Monophony Figure 1.3- Homophony

Origin

The exact origins of polyphony in the Western church are unknown the treatises Musica enchiriadis and Scolia enchiriadis (both from c.900) are usually

Most poly-phonic regions of the world include Europe, Oceania and Sub-Saharan Africa. Some also believe that the origins of polyphony in traditional music emerge from European professional music. There are also two contradicting approaches to the origin of polyphony in voice, the Cultural and Evolutionary Model. The cultural model states that the origins of polyphony are connected to the development of human musical nature and the evolutionary model says that the origins of polyphonic singing are much deeper and are connected to the early stages of human

Artist went back and studied ancient art to recreate their own but since musicians didn’t have much to refer to there made simple, balanced and plain polyphonies. This later became an epitome of complexity and ambiguity. In renaissance music there is notably ample use of “imitation”. This has become a huge part of Western Art music ever since. As the title suggests this is basically the repetition of a melody in a song. In renaissance music another important concept was developed. This was the concept of true harmony. Earlier only the root and the fifth were used this was known as “Shell harmony” later they believed true harmony was the root, third and fifth.

“Generally speaking, leadership of Western culture belonged to France during the later Middle Ages, then to Italy during the Renaissance. Music is an exception to this general account. While later medieval music was indeed led by France, Renaissance music was led by three regions, consecutively: Burgundy, then the Low Countries, then Italy.”- “Western Music”, Britannica encyclopedia, 2010 Summary

To conclude my report, I would like to summarize my points. It can be seen that broadly polyphony had been developed thoroughly in the Renaissance period. Although the initial development of polyphony started in the medieval times most of the changes and moderations were made during the renaissance period. Also adding to this other musical developments such true