Instruments

Tenor (Vocal)

The word "tenor" refers both to a vocal range and to a singer who performs music lying in that range: the tenor is the higher of the two main male voices in classical music, above the bass and below the usually female soprano and alto. Unlike those three terms, which simply designate levels of pitch, "tenor" (derived from the Latin tenere, to hold) has an illustrious and complex etymology. Vastly oversimplifying, we can say that some medieval theorists used the word tenor to indicate fixed or "held" portions of a chant. In multipart music of the medieval era, the tenor was the chant or other preexisting melody on which a composition was based. Originally this preexisting melody was used as the lowest line, but later it was placed second from the bottom, in its current position.