Chorale setting
A composition built on a chorale tune, such as a chorale prelude or chorale fantasia.
What it means
A chorale setting is a composition that takes a well-known Lutheran hymn tune as its basis and elaborates it artistically, rather than simply harmonizing it in four plain parts. The tune may appear unchanged in one voice, ornamented, or broken into motifs that the other voices weave around.
Musical use
Key forms include the chorale prelude, which introduces the coming hymn tune before congregational singing, the chorale fantasia with freer, often virtuosic treatment of the theme, and the chorale cantata, which spreads chorale lines across several movements. The genre reached its peak in the North German Baroque, above all in the work of Johann Sebastian Bach.
A chorale setting should be distinguished from a plain four-part chorale harmonization, which accompanies the tune without developing it further.
Performance practice
When you play a chorale setting, first learn the underlying hymn tune and sing it to yourself — that makes it much easier to hear how the composer has varied, hidden, or ornamented it.