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Perotin's works are preserved in the Magnus Liber, the "Great Book" of early polyphonic church music, which was in the collection of the cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris. The Magnus Liber also contains the works of his slightly earlier contemporary Léonin. However, attempts by scholars to place Perotin at Notre Dame have been inconclusive, and very little is known of his life. His dates of activity can be approximately established from some late 12th century edicts of Bishop of Paris, Odo of Sully , which mention organum triplum and quadruplum, and his known collaboration with poet Philip the Chancellor , whose Beata viscera he could not have set before about 1220. One source suggests that his Viderunt Omnes was composed for St. Stephen's Day ( December 26), 1199. His music, as well as that of Léonin and their anonymous contemporaries, have been grouped together as the School of Notre Dame.

Perotin composed organum, the earliest type of polyphonic musicMusic often an art/ entertainment, is a total social fact whose definitions vary according to era and culture," according to Jean Molino. 1 It is often contrasted with noise. According to musicologist Jean-Jacques Nattiez: "The border between music and no; previous European music, such as GregorianGregorian chant is also known as plainchant or plainsong, and is a form of monophonic, unaccompanied singing, which was developed in the Catholic church, mainly during the period 800- 1000. It takes its name from Pope St. Gregory the Great. This music was and other types of chantA chant is the rhythmic speaking or singing of words or sounds, either on a single note or with a simple melody involving a limited set of notes. Chants are used in a variety of settings. Supporters or players in sports contests may use them (see football, had been monophonicMonophonic can mean: In music, see: Texture (music). In recorded audio, a recording with only one channel. Compare: stereophonic, quadrophonic. In synthesizers, capable of only sounding one voice, or note, at a time. Compare: polyphonic. Also related, see. He pioneered the styles of organum triplum and organum quadruplum (three- and four-part polyphony); in fact his Sederunt principes and Viderunt omnes are among only a few organa quadrupla known. He was one of very few composers of his day whose name has been preserved, and can be reliably attached to individual compositions; this is due to the testimony of an anonymous English student at Notre Dame known as Anonymous IVAnonymous IV was an English student working at Notre Dame in Paris, most likely in the 1270s or 1280s. Nothing is known about his life, not even his name. His manuscripts survive in two partial copies from Bury St. Edmunds; one from the 13th century, and, who wrote about him.

A prominent feature of his compositional style was to take a simple, well-known melody and stretch it out in time, so each syllable was hundreds of seconds long, and then use each of those held notes (the tenorIn music, a tenor is a male singer with a high voice (although not as high as a countertenor). In four part chorale-style harmony, it is the second lowest voice, above the bass and below the soprano and alto. A typical tenor will have a range extending ro, Latin for "holder", or cantus firmusIn music, cantus firmus is the basic material to be set using polyphony. The cantus firmus was originally always taken from Gregorian Chant and was the fixed melodic material, moving in whole notes, around which other more florid lines, instrumental and/o) as the basis for rhythmically complex, interweaving lines above it. The result was that one or more vocal parts sang free, quickly moving lines (" discant s") over the chant below, which was extended to become a slowly shifting drone.

His music influenced modern " minimalist" composers such as Steve Reich, indeed, it can be argued that Perotin himself was a proto-minimalist. His works include the four-voice Viderunt omnes and Sederunt principes ; the three-voice Alleluia, Posui adiutorium , Alleluia, Nativitas , and nine others attributed to him by contemporary scholars on stylistic grounds, all in the organum style; the two-voice Dum sigillum summi Patris , and the monophonic Beata viscera in the conductus style. (The conductus sets a rhymed Latin poem called a sequence to a repeated melody, much like a contemporary hymn.) Anonymous IV called him "Perotin Magister" which means Perotin the master or expert.