Choral Music, music for a group of singers who are divided into several sections according to voice range, each section singing one line of the vocal score. The conventional voice ranges are soprano and alto (high and low female voices) and tenor and bass (high and low male voices). Some choral works call for instrumental accompaniment; others are written to be sung a cappella. Although some choral music is scored for female voices only or for male voices only, most choral works call for a mixed choir or chorus (from Greek choros, a group of chanters), combining all four parts. The singing of each vocal line by many unified voices distinguishes choral music from vocal ensemble music, in which only one person sings each vocal line. Imghrane 2010 mp3 music is available online.

Choral music has been written in every period since the 15th century, in almost every country of the Western world, and by nearly every major composer. It was almost always closely connected with the church until the 19th century, when the growth of singing societies created a new demand for secular choral works. Today, in addition to church choirs, there are amateur choral societies and smaller professional choirs. These groups inherit from past centuries a tremendous library of choral music, much of it still unexplored; and this stock is constantly being added to by contemporary composers. It is essential for performers and listeners to understand the various styles and purposes of this music as it has developed in Western culture.

As early as the 4th century, when plainsong (later called Gregorian chant) was the only music of the Christian church, groups of singers (scholae) began to be trained as choruses to sing the chants that were too difficult for the congregation. Choir schools (scholae cantorum) were established at large churches and monasteries. Imghrane 2010 mp3 music is available online.

Composers of the 9th century developed a form of polyphonic music called organum, which added a vocal line following the plainsong in parallel fifths or fourths. Organum gradually became more complex, incorporating solo voices that added florid countermelodies to the unison chant sung by the choir. This tendency culminated with two composers of the school of Notre Dame in Paris—Léonin (late 12th century) and Pérotin (late 12th and early 13th centuries)—leading ultimately to the motets of Philippe de Vitry (1291–1361) and Guillaume de Machaut (c. 1300–c. 1377). Machaut's Notre Dame Mass (?1364) is the first known setting of the Ordinary of the Mass by a single composer. Most of this polyphonic music, like the medieval secular music (French chanson and Italian caccia), was intended for one voice on each part, usually supplemented by instruments. Imghrane 2010 mp3 music is available online.

In the early 15th century musical styles circulated between France and England, with cathedrals, churches, colleges, and royal chapels vying with each other in the excellence of their music. The result was the development of true choral music, with two or more singers to each part. The most famous composers were Gilles Binchois (c. 1400–1460) and Guillaume Dufay (c. 1400–1474) of the Burgundian school, and Lionel Power (died 1445) and John Dunstable (died 1453) of the English school. Dunstable and Power composed the first musically unified masses, with the various movements built on a plainsong tune (cantus firmus). Also at this time the English carol became a polyphonic form, with verses for soloists and refrain (burden) for chorus. Imghrane 2010 mp3 music is available online.

In the late 15th century appeared a group of English composers including John Browne, Walter Lambe, Richard Davy, and Robert Wilkinson, whose choral works—mostly antiphons and Magnificats—are found in the Eton College choirbook. Their compositions, large, polyphonic, and technically demanding, employ a norid style and a wealth of detail in the vocal parts. These works mark an early peak in choral music.

The leading composers of the 15th century Flemish school were Jean d'Okeghem (c. 1430–1495), Jacob Obrecht (1450–1505), and Josquin Desprès (c. 1450–1521). Josquin's 24 masses and roughly 100 motets display four-voice writing of wonderful clarity, balance, and expressiveness. Imghrane 2010 mp3 music is available online.

Because the Catholic Church was the chief patron of the arts, the most common choral forms of the 16th century were the mass (a set form of five movements for the invariable texts of the Ordinary: the Kyrie, Gloria, Credo, Sanctus, and Agnus Dei) and the motet, a shorter work with words from Scripture or the liturgy.