We have all heard it, yet most of us would not be able to name it. The term polyphony (from the Greek for “many sounds”) is used to describe music that employs simultaneous yet independent melodies.

Pope Francis has encouraged the Church to make sure that liturgical music fulfills its purpose. As he told participants in an international conference on sacred music March 4, church music should ...

NORTHAMPTON, Mass. -- Though they’ve made a name for themselves singing music that’s hundreds of years old, the four men of New York Polyphony are unequivocably voices of their own times, not ancient ...

A concert of Renaissance Christmas music might seem like an odd place for a world premiere, but a new composition by Nico Muhly found a way to harmonize with the polyphony of Palestrina, Byrd, and ...

On Blue Heron’s recent performance of English polyphony from the Peterhouse Partbooks. For their “Lost Music of Canterbury” concert, the thirteen members of the Blue Heron choir divided into five ...

Editor’s note: To listen along as you read, click the links in the text. These pieces were performed for The Economist by the choir of Jesus College, Cambridge. IN 1605 Charles de Ligny, a Frenchman, ...

The Glee Club and Choral Society have just issued a 12-inch record of Sixteenth Century music, mostly Palestrina, with selections of Byrd, Lassus, and Amerio (Cambridge, CRS405). Some of this is a ...