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.

I have purchased and listen often to many recordings of liturgical music: Gregorian chant, English Recusant polyphony, the great Counter-Reformation polyphonic works of Victoria, Palestrina, Gesualdo, ...

New research has uncovered the earliest known practical piece of polyphonic music, an example of the principles that laid the foundations of European musical tradition. The earliest known practical ...