The Melody Web what each genre heard, and what it passed on

heard passed on Click or tap a node to recenter. Use a connecting line, or Influence, for the story.

Heard

Plainchant tradition · 9th century–

Western written polyphony begins as a way of dressing liturgical chant, not as an independent repertory.

Influence
Troubadour genre · 1100–1300

Written polyphony takes the courtly vernacular — strophic lyric, refrain forms, fin’amor topics — into pieces that are no longer monophonic.

Influence

Medieval polyphony

style · 9th century–15th century

Also called medieval music, medieval sacred polyphony

Includes Ars antiqua, Ars nova, Ars subtilior, Organum

Umbrella for Western written polyphony before the fifteenth-century turn: dressing a chant tenor, then the measured motet, then Ars nova mensural song. Concert programs often say “medieval music”; that bin also holds Plainchant and Troubadour, which are not children of this node. This file is the polyphonic wing only. It is not a market genre and not an unfinished Renaissance.

Listen

  1. Viderunt omnes Pérotin (1198) YouTube
  2. Sederunt principes Pérotin (1199) YouTube
  3. Viderunt omnes (organum duplum) Léonin (1160s) YouTube
  4. Messe de Nostre Dame, Kyrie Guillaume de Machaut (1365) YouTube
  5. Quant en moy / Amour et biaute / Amara valde Guillaume de Machaut (1350s) YouTube
  6. Sumer is icumen in Reading Abbey manuscript (1260) YouTube
  7. Garrit gallus / In nova fert / Neuma Philippe de Vitry (1310s) YouTube
  8. Beata viscera Pérotin (1200) YouTube
  9. O mitissima / Virgo / Haec dies Notre-Dame motet (13th century) YouTube
  10. Hoquetus David Guillaume de Machaut (1360s) YouTube

Passed on

Ars antiqua style · 1200–1320

Ars antiqua is the umbrella’s thirteenth-century dialect: modal then Franconian measurement, the motet as a separately texted piece on a tenor, and conductus as newly composed syl…

Influence
Ars nova style · 1310–1380

Ars nova is the umbrella’s fourteenth-century French dialect: notation that can write independent speeds, the isorhythmic motet, Machaut’s mass, and polyphonic ballade/rondeau/vir…

Influence
Organum style · 9th century–1220

Organum is the first named job of the umbrella: write (or improvise) extra voices on a liturgical tenor already in the service.

Influence
Renaissance polyphony style · 1420–1600

Renaissance composers inherit a written polyphonic craft: mensural notation, tenor-based construction, and chapel performance.

Influence

Plainchant → Medieval polyphony

melodyform and structurefunction and contextperformance practicestrength: highwell documented9th century–14th centuryliturgypedagogynotationoral

Mechanism

Western written polyphony begins as a way of dressing liturgical chant, not as an independent repertory. Early organum holds a chant line as tenor and adds a second voice (parallel, then contrary and measured). Notre-Dame organum and clausulae still take their structure and pitch set from the chant of the day. The motet grows by adding text to those discant voices while the tenor remains a chant excerpt, often isorhythmically treated later. Liturgical function is the reason the donor melody is there. Strength high on the umbrella. A tighter first landing is plainchant organum.

Evidence

Musica enchiriadis describes singing a chant with a second voice at the fourth or fifth. The Magnus liber organi and related sources build two-, three-, and four-voice structures on identifiable Gregorian tenors (for example, Viderunt omnes). Fourteenth-century isorhythmic motets still frequently use chant color.

Debate

None recorded on the basic dependence. Debate concerns how much early organum was improvised rather than written, and how to transcribe rhythm before modal notation.

Mediators

institution: Notre-Dame cathedral school; community: monastic and cathedral scholae

Troubadour → Medieval polyphony

melodyform and structurefunction and contextstrength: mediumscholarly consensus1230–1370oralnotationpatronage

Mechanism

Written polyphony takes the courtly vernacular — strophic lyric, refrain forms, fin’amor topics — into pieces that are no longer monophonic. Thirteenth-century motets set French texts over a chant tenor; fourteenth-century song writes polyphonic ballade, rondeau, and virelai. Strength medium on the umbrella: the chapel motet and mass remain chant-driven. A tighter landing is troubadour ars nova. This is influence, not taxonomy; troubadour song is not a kind of medieval polyphony.

Evidence

French-texted motets in Montpellier; Adam de la Halle as trouvère and motet composer; Machaut’s songbook as a poet-composer catalog. Hoppin and Grove treat the vernacular lyric as the secular donor beside chant.

Debate

How much polyphonic song still is trouvère craft versus a new mensural art that only keeps the poetry. The umbrella edge records the entry of that lyric into the written polyphonic language; it does not claim the mass.

Mediators

artist: Adam de la Halle; artist: Guillaume de Machaut

Medieval polyphony → Ars antiqua

form and structurerhythmperformance practicestrength: highscholarly consensus1200–1320notationpedagogyliturgy

Mechanism

Ars antiqua is the umbrella’s thirteenth-century dialect: modal then Franconian measurement, the motet as a separately texted piece on a tenor, and conductus as newly composed syllabic polyphony. Taxonomically a style of Medieval polyphony. Strength high on the child.

Evidence

Montpellier and Bamberg motet collections; Franco’s Ars cantus mensurabilis; Notre-Dame conductus books.

Debate

The name is retrospective (coined against Ars nova). It still names a real repertory and notation stage.

Mediators

community: Parisian clerks; artist: Franco of Cologne

Medieval polyphony → Ars nova

rhythmform and structureperformance practicestrength: highscholarly consensus1310–1380notationpedagogypatronage

Mechanism

Ars nova is the umbrella’s fourteenth-century French dialect: notation that can write independent speeds, the isorhythmic motet, Machaut’s mass, and polyphonic ballade/rondeau/virelai. Taxonomically a style of Medieval polyphony. Strength high on the child. Trecento and Ars subtilior are not folded in.

Evidence

Vitry’s motets and the Ars nova teaching; Machaut’s complete-works manuscripts.

Debate

Whether “Ars nova” is only a treatise slogan. The corpus keeps it as a named style because the Renaissance exit is unintelligible without a fourteenth-century mensural song-and-motet donor.

Mediators

artist: Philippe de Vitry; artist: Guillaume de Machaut

Medieval polyphony → Organum

melodyform and structureperformance practicefunction and contextstrength: highscholarly consensus9th century–1220liturgypedagogynotationoral

Mechanism

Organum is the first named job of the umbrella: write (or improvise) extra voices on a liturgical tenor already in the service. Taxonomically it is a style of Medieval polyphony; this edge names the transferable craft — chant-bearing texture, chapel training, and perfect-interval framing. Strength high on the child.

Evidence

Musica enchiriadis, Aquitanian florid organum, and the Magnus liber organi. Léonin and Pérotin are the usual Notre-Dame names (Anonymous 4).

Debate

Whether early organum belongs in the same node as Notre-Dame quadrupla. The corpus keeps one child for the chant-dressing practice; the motet is the next style.

Mediators

institution: Notre-Dame cathedral school

Medieval polyphony → Renaissance polyphony

harmonyform and structureperformance practicestrength: highscholarly consensus1400–1500notationpedagogypatronage

Mechanism

Renaissance composers inherit a written polyphonic craft: mensural notation, tenor-based construction, and chapel performance. What changes is texture and sonority — imitation among more equal voices, preference for thirds and sixths, and cyclic mass architecture — not the fact of coordinated independent lines. The cantus-firmus mass is a direct descendant of the chant-bearing medieval motet, now expanded into a five-movement ritual cycle.

Evidence

Dufay’s and Ockeghem’s tenor masses still build on a borrowed melody as medieval motets did. English preference for imperfect consonances (the so-called contenance angloise) is received on the continent as a new color inside an old technique. Choir schools remain the training path.

Debate

Period labels (“medieval” vs “Renaissance”) are modern. Some historians stress a break around 1420; others a long fifteenth century. The edge records technical continuity, not a clean epoch cut.

Mediators

artist: John Dunstaple; artist: Guillaume Du Fay