Chanting
One of the long standing traditions of the Church and Monastic Life is chanting. Plainchant is a monophonic and is a free rhythm style, which is used in the Western Church. Gregorian chant is a type of plainchant named after Pope Gregory I (6th century AD). Many Benedictine monasteries today use Gregorian chant in their liturgies and Divine Office.
Here is a great website that has many links on Gregorian chant from Prof. Peter Jeffrey of Princeton University.
Wikipedia has an extensive history of Gregorian chant with a few examples.
Lessons in Gregorian chant - Schola Cantorum Bogotensis
Below is a YouTube video of nature scenes and Benedictine monks chanting.
The Eastern Church has a rich history of chanting as well. Here is a online Orthodox Eastern chant documentation project that has worked on getting various Eastern chant from various countries. Orthodoxwiki has a wonderful information on Byzantine chant. Here are the religious songs from the the Russian monastery Valaam.
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