Draft:Catholicism’s effect on music

Catholicism's effect on music encompasses the Gregorian Chant, works commissioned by the church for classical music, and the origins of Solfège.

Gregorian Chant
Main article : Gregorian Chant

Pope Gregory I is usually credited with creating the Gregorian chant, but most scholars agree he introduced the chant from earlier Roman and Gallican Chants. These chants are usually sung with no music, and can be sung using six-note patterns called hexachords. These are notably still notated today using neume, the way in writing music in which our current music notation evolved from, and are usually credited with popularizing neume.

Solfège
Main article : Solfège

Solfèdge was created by benidictian monk Guido of Arezoo to help simplify the concepts of pitch for his students. Guido got musical syllables from the latin hymn "Ut queant laxis", a hymn made for the Catholic saint, St. John the Baptist, by another benidictian monk named Paulus Diaconus, or Paul the Deacon. At the time of its creation, the system originally only had five musical syllables; Ut, Re, Mi, Fa, La. Over time though, it evolved into the solfèdge system we know today.

Classical Music
Main article : Classical Music

During the Classical Period, many different writers, like Ludwig Van Beethoven and Wolfgang Amadues Mozart, wrote music for the Catholic mass. A substantial amount of famous classical music pieces, like Reqiuem in D minor, were written for specific Catholic masses like Easter or Christmas.