CANTIONAL

   Simple, four-voice homophonic arrangement of a chorale, with the chorale melody in the soprano voice, not the tenor as had been traditional with polyphonic German Lieder. The earliest collection is Lucas Osiander’s Fünftzig geistliche Lieder und Psalmen (Nuremburg, 1586).

   Also, as kancionál, the Czech term for a book of sacred songs deriving from a tradition of congregational singing arising during Hussite influence in the 15th century, whence it passed to the Bohemian Brethren, who in turn brought the tradition to America.