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Polyphony and monophony in instruments
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Look up <i>polyphony</i>, <i>polyphonic</i>, <i>monophony</i>, or <i>monophonic</i> in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. <p>Polyphony is a property of musical instruments that means that they can play multiple independent melody lines simultaneously. Instruments featuring polyphony are said to be polyphonic. Instruments that are not capable of polyphony are <a href="/facts/Monophony/2TQJx4x1">monophonic</a> or <a href="/facts/Paraphony/FUJDT6BY">paraphonic</a>. </p><p>An intuitively understandable example for a polyphonic instrument is a (classical) <a href="/facts/Piano/lRI60lQK">piano</a>, on which the player plays different melody lines with the left and the right hand - depending on music style and composition, these may be musically tightly interrelated or may even be totally unrelated to each other, like in parts of <a href="/facts/Jazz/lmUzXGq8">Jazz</a> music. An example for monophonic instruments is a <a href="/facts/Trumpet/QzvHkd6V">trumpet</a> which can generate only one tone (frequency) at a time, except when played by extraordinary musicians. </p>