Crossword clues for plainsong
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
Wiktionary
alt. (context music English) A form of monophonic chant, sung in unison using the Gregorian scale and sung in various Christian churches. n. (context music English) A form of monophonic chant, sung in unison using the Gregorian scale and sung in various Christian churches.
WordNet
n. a liturgical chant of the Roman Catholic Church [syn: plainchant, Gregorian chant]
Wikipedia
Plainsong (also plainchant; ) is a body of chants used in the liturgies of the Western Church. Though the Eastern Orthodox churches and the Western Church did not split until long after the origin of plainsong, Byzantine chants are generally not classified as plainsong.
Plainsong is monophonic, consisting of a single, unaccompanied melodic line. Its rhythm is generally freer than the metered rhythm of later Western music.
Plainsong may refer to:
- Plainsong, the body of traditional songs used in the liturgies of the Roman Catholic Church
- Plainsong, a musical group fronted by Iain Matthews
- Plainsong, a 1999 novel by Kent Haruf
- Plainsong, a 1990 novel by Deborah Grabien
- Plainsong, a 2004 TV movie starring Aidan Quinn
- "Plainsong", track 1 of Disintegration, a 1989 album by The Cure
Plainsong is a bestselling novel by Kent Haruf.
Set in the fictional town of Holt, Colorado, it tells the interlocking stories of some of the inhabitants.
The title comes from a type of unadorned music sung in Christian churches, and is a reference to both the Great Plains setting and the simple style of the writing.
The novel was adapted in 2004 into a Hallmark Hall of Fame TV movie on CBS.
Plainsong was originally a British country rock/ folk rock band, formed in early 1972 by Ian (later Iain) Matthews, formerly of Fairport Convention; Andy Roberts, previously of The Liverpool Scene; Dave Richards; and Bob Ronga. The original group split up before the end of 1972 but, since the early 1990s, Matthews and Roberts intermittently performed and recorded together, with other musicians, as Plainsong
Usage examples of "plainsong".
Remember the monks at Maria Laach, the plainsong of Tenebrae on Good Friday.
Somewhere out in the house (though he may have dreamed that too) a chorus had begun singing a Dies Irae in plainsong.
In his harsh unmusical voice he chanted plainsong, which had a better covering effect: he had reached a Benedictus in the Dorian mode and he was straining for a high qui venit when the clear sharp voice of gunfire - carronade-fire - cut him short.
If we are saddened for ourselves that he is leaving us, it is tempered with joy that he has now achieved his heart's desire and will return to his beloved Hertfordshire, where he expects to devote his retirement years to civic affairs, transcendental meditation, and the study of plainsong.