Chamber music
Music for a small scoring.
What it means
Chamber music is music for a small scoring in which every voice is cast with one player. It thus differs from the orchestra, in which voices are cast multiply, and from the solo piece. The span reaches from the duo to ensembles of eight or ten players; fixed genres are the string trio, string quartet, piano trio, wind quintet, and others. Originally the term designated the place of performance — the chamber as opposed to church and theatre.
Musical use
Everything else follows from the one-to-a-part scoring: every voice is audible and carries responsibility, there is no direction from outside, and the shaping is negotiated among those involved. Composers use this for particularly dense work; the string quartet has counted since the late eighteenth century as the most demanding genre, because four voices of the same kind allow no expenditure of sound behind which weaknesses could hide. At the same time chamber music is a field of communal music-making for amateurs as well as professional musicians, with a repertoire from several centuries.
Chamber music was originally played in living rooms and at court, not in churches or theatres. Today it is a fixed part of concert life.
Performance practice
Rehearse in a circle or in an arrangement in which everyone hears and sees one another; a large part of communication runs through glance and breath. Settle phrasing, articulation, and tempo relations together and not by adopting one opinion. While playing, listen to the other voices, especially when you are accompanying. Practise tricky passages as a duo or trio instead of always in the tutti. Fix entries and endings expressly and rehearse the transitions between sections.
Bear in mind that rehearsal work without a conductor is an art of its own: decisions must be spoken and recorded, otherwise every rehearsal plays differently. Keep a shared list of the agreements. Rehearse in changing partial scorings, because voice relationships are best clarified this way. Retune regularly even during rehearsal, because intonation covers nothing here.
Keep a shared rehearsal log, because agreements otherwise get lost between sessions.