Music from the Earliest Notations to the Sixteenth Century

Modal rhythm, in short, now loses the patterning and governing properties that were its original
reason for being. Not only that, but the exaggerated rhythmic differentiation of the triplum from the
supporting voices belies the origin of the motet style in the note-against-note texture of discant
composition. Once again a connection that can be traced easily enough through time has been shed at the
stylistic level. That is what is meant by stylistic evolution. One can trace it with interest, appreciate its
vicissitudes, delight in the new possibilities it creates, and marvel at the ingenuity with which these
possibilities are exploited, and yet remain skeptical of the notion that art makes progress.