Definitions
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun In music, a middle part between the tenor and the treble; counter-tenor.
- noun One who sings this part.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun (Mus.) Counter tenor; contralto.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun music
countertenor
Etymologies
Sorry, no etymologies found.
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Examples
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But around 1450, or even before, composers and performers started to use a contratenor bassus, derived not from the discantus but from the tenor, beneath which they sang alternate 3rds and 5ths, beginning and ending with a unison or octave, and with the cadential octave preceded by a 5th; to the resulting tricinium a new kind of contratenor altus might also be added, by singing alternate 3rds and 4ths above the tenor, beginning and ending with a 5th, and with the cadential 5th preceded by a 4th see exx.3 and 4 below.
Archive 2008-02-01 bls 2008
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The particularly angular contratenor in syncopated binary rhythms exemplifies the terrible conflicts of which the texts speaks.
Archive 2009-04-01 Lu 2009
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The pieces share the traits typical of their genre in the later 15th century: a treble-dominated texture, probably intended for texted performance of the top voice and solmized or instrumental performance of the lower voices; a contrapuntal structure built around a duet of discantus and tenor with an added contratenor; a break roughly halfway through corresponding to the division in the poetic form; and a prevailing line-for-line agreement of music and refrain text.
Archive 2009-05-01 Lu 2009
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The contratenor, usually moving in 2nds, 4ths and 5ths, lends a quasi-harmonic feeling to the music, but sometimes produces awkward combinations with the other voices.
Archive 2009-05-01 Lu 2009
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The four-voice Puisque ma dame/Je m'en voy combines its primary poem with a second, incompletely preserved text in the contratenor altus in a way that finds no counterpart among songs of the period.
Archive 2009-04-01 Lu 2009
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Other aspects – repeated notes, homorhythmic textures, rhythmically diminished motivic reworking, and consistent anticipation by the contratenor and discantus of the tenor's melody in one piece, Vostre oeul – bespeak a more modern style.
Archive 2009-05-01 Lu 2009
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For three voices, in duple meter, based on a structural duet of discantus and tenor with an added contratenor, and occasionally imitative, they display the usual characteristics of the genre.
Archive 2009-05-01 Lu 2009
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The earliest method was to derive a contratenor altus from the written discantus by singing the same notes simultaneously at the 4th below, which produced essentially a chain of what would now be called 6-3 chords, varied and punctuated by single 8-5 chords, though with some decorative passing notes and suspensions, particularly at cadences, and on occasion more licentious dissonances.
Archive 2008-02-01 bls 2008
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Veche din Berlin, solişti: Efrat Ben - Nun - soprană, Andreas Scholl - contratenor, James Taylor - tenor, Klaus Häger - bas
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A l’audience seems particularly uncertain in that it is the only four-voice piece attributed to Hayne, though the contratenor may be a si placet part.
Archive 2009-05-01 Lu 2009
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