Cori Spezzati

What it means

Cori spezzati, Italian for “split choirs,” denotes a polychoral compositional and performance practice in which two or more vocal or instrumental groups are placed physically apart and perform in alternation or together. This spatial separation is no accident but a compositional device in itself: sound moves back and forth between the choirs or merges at certain points into a full, combined polychoral texture.

Musical use

The technique flourished in Venice around 1600, favored by the particular architecture of St Mark's Basilica with its two facing organ lofts, which allowed choirs to be naturally placed apart. Key composers included Adrian Willaert, who as maestro di cappella at St Mark's wrote early polychoral psalm settings, and later Andrea Gabrieli and his nephew Giovanni Gabrieli, whose polychoral motets and sonatas brought the technique to full splendor.

Cori spezzati should be distinguished from simple double-choir writing, where two choirs sing together in the same loft without any particular spatial effect: only the deliberate spatial separation and the compositional play with echo and answering effects make up Venetian polychoral writing in the strict sense. The style also influenced early instrumental music, for instance Giovanni Gabrieli's Sonata pian e forte, considered one of the earliest works with an explicit dynamic marking.

Performance practice

If you take part in a performance in the cori spezzati style, watch for precise timing between the spatially separated groups, since the delay caused by the space makes coordination harder. Make deliberate use of the possibility of letting sound travel from one side to the other, rather than treating the spatial separation as a mere organizational detail.