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

Ars nova style · 1310–1380

The fifteenth-century chapel keeps the Ars nova fact that a piece is a written, attributable object (mass, motet, chanson) in mensural notation.

Influence
Ars subtilior style · 1380–1420

Renaissance chapel polyphony takes subtilior’s late-medieval chanson job and thins the proportional puzzle into a singing chapel style (Dufay).

Influence
Medieval polyphony style · 9th century–15th century

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

Influence
Plainchant tradition · 9th century–

Renaissance sacred polyphony takes plainchant as cantus firmus and paraphrase — the cyclic mass and motet built on a liturgical tune.

Influence

Renaissance polyphony

style · 1420–1600

Also called Franco-Flemish polyphony

The fifteenth- and sixteenth-century art of imitative vocal polyphony associated with Dufay, Ockeghem, Josquin, Palestrina, Lassus, and Victoria, alongside a growing instrumental and vernacular song culture. Harmony is still modal; texture is the craft. It hears Medieval polyphony and Ars nova for the written-polyphony exit, and Plainchant for cantus-firmus and paraphrase. It already gives Baroque, intermedio, lute, vihuela, falsobordone, and trallalero. It gives Metrical psalmody the chanson and note-against-note tune craft. Madrigal leftover as a secular wing on this node. Anglican service music leftover as a later English church dialect.

Listen

  1. Missa Papae Marcelli, Kyrie Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina (1562) YouTube
  2. Sicut cervus Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina (1584) YouTube · Amazon
  3. Spem in alium Thomas Tallis (1570) YouTube
  4. Ave Maria... virgo serena Josquin des Prez (1480s) YouTube
  5. Mille regretz Josquin des Prez (1520s) YouTube
  6. O magnum mysterium Tomás Luis de Victoria (1572) YouTube
  7. If Ye Love Me Thomas Tallis (1565) YouTube
  8. Missa Pange lingua, Kyrie Josquin des Prez (1515) YouTube
  9. Super flumina Babylonis Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina (1581) YouTube
  10. O vos omnes Tomás Luis de Victoria (1572) YouTube

Passed on

Baroque style · 1600–1750

Baroque style defines itself against equal-voice polyphony and also keeps that polyphony as a sacred and pedagogical language (stile antico).

Influence
Falsobordone practice · 1480–1750

Falsobordone takes triad and cadence literacy from the same chapels that sing imitative polyphony, and applies it to a reciting-tone job.

Influence
Italian intermedio form · 1480–1600

The sung intermedio is written by the same court musicians who write madrigals and chapel polyphony.

Influence
Metrical psalmody practice · 1530–

Metrical psalmody takes Renaissance chanson and note-against-note craft — singable tunes, even pacing, simple cadence — and fits them to vernacular psalm metres.

Influence
Renaissance lute practice · 1480–1620

The Renaissance lute’s prestige job is vocal polyphony on one instrument: intabulate a chanson or motet, then write ricercar that thinks in those voices.

Influence
Trallalero tradition · 1850–

Genoa already knows part-singing.

Influence
Vihuela practice · 1500–1600

Vihuela books take chapel and chanson polyphony onto one set of courses: intabulation, then newly composed fantasía in that voice-leading.

Influence

Ars nova → Renaissance polyphony

form and structurerhythmperformance practicestrength: mediumscholarly consensus1420–1470notationpedagogypatronage

Mechanism

The fifteenth-century chapel keeps the Ars nova fact that a piece is a written, attributable object (mass, motet, chanson) in mensural notation. What changes is the sound: imitation, third and sixth, the cyclic mass. Strength medium. Du Fay is the usual hinge. This is influence, not a claim that Renaissance polyphony is a style of Ars nova.

Evidence

Machaut’s mass and songbooks as the late-medieval composer catalog; Du Fay and the Burgundian chapels; Hoppin and Atlas on the notational and institutional continuity.

Debate

English contenance angloise is a second donor already sitting under the medieval-to-Renaissance umbrella edge. This file isolates what Ars nova specifically passes: the written chapel job. Ars subtilior is a late thickening, not a second parent.

Mediators

artist: Guillaume Du Fay; institution: Burgundian and papal chapels

Ars subtilior → Renaissance polyphony

rhythmform and structureperformance practicestrength: mediumscholarly consensus1410–1440notationpedagogypatronage

Mechanism

Renaissance chapel polyphony takes subtilior’s late-medieval chanson job and thins the proportional puzzle into a singing chapel style (Dufay). Strength medium. ars nova renaissance polyphony is the longer mensural parent; this hop is the named mannered court style the chapel leaves. Ciconia leftover as a person at the hinge.

Evidence

Early Dufay against Chantilly-generation complication; Grove and Hoppin on the 1420s turn; Taruskin on chapel style after the mannered court.

Debate

Whether Dufay simply continues Ars nova. The corpus already has that long hop; this edge is the specific exit from named subtilior mannerism.

Mediators

artist: Guillaume Du Fay

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

Plainchant → Renaissance polyphony

melodyform and structurefunction and contextstrength: highscholarly consensus1420–1600liturgynotationpedagogy

Mechanism

Renaissance sacred polyphony takes plainchant as cantus firmus and paraphrase — the cyclic mass and motet built on a liturgical tune. Strength high. plainchant medieval polyphony and plainchant organum are the earlier tenor hops; this edge is the fifteenth- and sixteenth-century paraphrase job. Sequence leftover as a chant genre on the plainchant node.

Evidence

Josquin paraphrase masses; Palestrina’s chant-bearing motets; Atlas and Hiley on cantus firmus and paraphrase technique.

Debate

Whether this is already medieval polyphony’s tenor job. Organum holds chant in long notes; Renaissance paraphrase sings the chant through imitative voices as a new craft.

Mediators

artist: Josquin des Prez; artist: Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina

Renaissance polyphony → Baroque

harmonyform and structureperformance practicestrength: highscholarly consensus1580–1650notationpedagogypatronageliturgy

Mechanism

Baroque style defines itself against equal-voice polyphony and also keeps that polyphony as a sacred and pedagogical language (stile antico). Figured bass and monody grow out of late-Renaissance experiments (concertato, recitar cantando, chromatic madrigal) that already strain modal counterpoint. Cadence, dissonance treatment, and choir training remain Renaissance-taught skills, now subordinated to bass-led tonality and dramatic contrast.

Evidence

Monteverdi’s preface to Cruda Amarilli / Orfeo era writings argue a “second practice” that licenses text-driven dissonance against Zarlino-style rules. Church composers (including Bach much later) still write a cappella or alla breve masses in a Palestrina dialect. The continuo realization itself assumes fluency in Renaissance interval grammar.

Debate

How “tonal” late Renaissance music already is, and whether 1600 is a rupture or a branding of trends underway in Ferrara, Venice, and Florence. Consensus holds that the polyphonic craft is the necessary prior.

Mediators

institution: Roman and Venetian chapels; artist: Claudio Monteverdi

Renaissance polyphony → Falsobordone

harmonyperformance practicestrength: mediumscholarly consensus1480–1600pedagogynotationliturgy

Mechanism

Falsobordone takes triad and cadence literacy from the same chapels that sing imitative polyphony, and applies it to a reciting-tone job. Strength medium. This is not a style of Renaissance polyphony. Burgundian fauxbourdon (parallel sixths) stays on the donor node.

Evidence

Southern-European attestation from the 1480s; four-part close-position triads; Atlas on chapel craft; Grove’s warning not to collapse fauxbourdon and falsobordone.

Debate

Etymology tempts a single node. Consensus: Italian/Iberian psalm-chords are this file; Burgundian fauxbourdon is a different technique. Do not hang Josquin Masses on this hop.

Mediators

institution: Italian and Iberian chapels

Renaissance polyphony → Italian intermedio

melodyharmonyform and structuretimbre and productionstrength: mediumscholarly consensus1539–1589patronagenotationpedagogy

Mechanism

The sung intermedio is written by the same court musicians who write madrigals and chapel polyphony. Texture, modal harmony, and declamatory late-century melody move onto a festival stage with machines and extra band. Strength medium. The floor’s job (allegory between acts) is not a Mass.

Evidence

1589 Pellegrina numbers by Marenzio, Caccini, Cavalieri, Malvezzi; Atlas on the late madrigal and festival culture. This is the umbrella hop; a separate madrigal node would be a tighter later child.

Debate

Early opera is a sibling exit (stile rappresentativo), not this edge’s target. Do not hang ballet de cour directly on Josquin.

Mediators

institution: Medici and other north-Italian courts; artist: Luca Marenzio

Renaissance polyphony → Metrical psalmody

melodyform and structureharmonystrength: mediumscholarly consensus1539–1562notationliturgypedagogy

Mechanism

Metrical psalmody takes Renaissance chanson and note-against-note craft — singable tunes, even pacing, simple cadence — and fits them to vernacular psalm metres. Strength medium. Plainchant leftover as a different liturgical parent, not this hop. Lutheran chorale leftover as a Reformation sibling.

Evidence

Bourgeois and the Genevan psalter drawing on chanson models; Sternhold and Hopkins as the English reception; Grove and Atlas on contrafact and tune craft.

Debate

Whether psalm tunes are simply folk song. The named Genevan and English books are literate products of Renaissance song craft in a Reformed job.

Mediators

artist: Louis Bourgeois; institution: Genevan psalter

Renaissance polyphony → Renaissance lute

melodyharmonyform and structureperformance practicestrength: highscholarly consensus1507–1600notationpatronagepedagogy

Mechanism

The Renaissance lute’s prestige job is vocal polyphony on one instrument: intabulate a chanson or motet, then write ricercar that thinks in those voices. Strength high. Petrucci’s 1507 lute books are the emblem. The oud-to-body story is not this edge.

Evidence

Spinacino and Dalza prints; Francesco da Milano fantasias; Dowland songs that still live as part-music. Atlas on intabulation.

Debate

Some lute dances are tenor-and-tune, not chapel polyphony. The edge is the literate core, not every pavan. Spanish vihuela intabulation is a parallel landing (renaissance polyphony vihuela), not a substitute for the lute hop.

Mediators

institution: Italian and northern print shops

Renaissance polyphony → Trallalero

performance practiceharmonystrength: mediumwell documented1850–1930oralpedagogy

Mechanism

Genoa already knows part-singing. Trallalero takes that urban literacy — stacked male voices, a choir habit — into the docks. Strength medium. The line is long and thin: chapel craft is not the squadra repertory.

Evidence

Genoa as a Renaissance music city; nineteenth-century workers’ polyphony in the same streets; the chitarra voice as a later local fact.

Debate

Whether this over-points at the Renaissance umbrella. Alternative: only romanticism trallalero. Keep both: one is literacy, one is the century of the name. Do not parent from Paghjella.

Mediators

community: Genoese urban singers

Renaissance polyphony → Vihuela

melodyharmonyform and structurestrength: highscholarly consensus1530–1550notationpatronagepedagogy

Mechanism

Vihuela books take chapel and chanson polyphony onto one set of courses: intabulation, then newly composed fantasía in that voice-leading. Strength high for repertory and texture. The instrument and tablature school are the lute hop.

Evidence

Narváez Mille regretz (1538) already listed on the target; Mudarra and Valderrábano song settings; Atlas on intabulation as a period literacy.

Debate

This is not a claim that Palestrina “is” vihuela music. Diferencias on grounds are a second, popular-tenor job. Do not treat intabulation as flamenco toque.

Mediators

artist: Luis de Narváez