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The prevailing melody of its monophonic style proved suitable to furnish a subject for the most animated discussion. Three contrasting movements were adopted, comprising a summons to attention, an appeal to both intellect and emotions, and a lively reaction after excitement.
Meanwhile the growth of the individual led to the growth of monophony in music, in which one voice stands out prominently, with an accompaniment of other voices. Its instrumental flower was reached in the symphony. Melody reigns supreme in monophonic music. Both the canon and the fugue form a commonwealth, in which all voices are rated alike.
They at any rate perceived that the vital fact concerning the new monophonic style was that the melody alone demanded individual independence, while the other parts could not, as in polyphony, ask for equal suffrage, but must sink themselves in the solid and concrete structure of the supporting chord.
The metronomic markings are about the same in all editions. Asiatic wildness, according to Von Bulow, pervades the B minor study, op. 25, No. 10, although Willeby claims it to be only a study in octaves "for the left hand"! Von Bulow furthermore compares it, because of its monophonic character, to the Chorus of Dervishes in Beethoven's "Ruins of Athens."
Simple melodies with or without accompanying chords are monophonic; many melodies woven together, as in the Bach piece which we have looked over, are polyphonic. In the history of music two men surpassed all others in what they accomplished in counterpoint that is, in polyphonic writing. The one was Palestrina, an Italian; the other was Bach, a German.
Whatever the troubadours and minnesingers may have done toward establishing a metrical melodic form of monophonic character was soon obliterated by the swift popularity of part singing and the immense vogue of the secular songs of the polyphonic composers.
Pure counterpoint could not give us such a charming effect as Chopin obtains in the first study of Opus 10; nor could the plainer and more free harmonic style give us such delicate bits of tracery as Bach has in his fugues. If now you will take the trouble to learn two long words, later in your study of music they will be of use to you. The first is Polyphonic; the other is Monophonic.
Mono means one, poly means many. We say monotone, meaning one tone; also polygon, meaning many sides. In the musical reference monophonic music means music of one voice, rather than of one tone, and polyphonic music is that for many voices.
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