A person skilled in singing descants; a member of a choir who specializes in performing descant parts.
From 'descant' + '-ist' suffix denoting a specialist or practitioner. This term specifically refers to musicians trained in the complex skill of descant singing.
Descantists in medieval cathedrals were like the virtuosos of their time—they had to improvise ornamental lines over plainchant, essentially doing complex musical math in real-time in front of hundreds of people.
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