English

Etymology

Italian stretto.

Pronunciation

IPA: /'strɛtəʊ/

Adverb

stretto

1. with gradually increasing speed

Adjective

stretto

1. having gradually increasing speed

   • 1960: So that over and above the public components – holidays, tourist attractions – there are private meanderings, linked to the climate as if this spell were a stretto passage in the year’s fugue: haphazard weather, aimless loves, unpredicted commitments… — Thomas Pynchon, ‘Entropy’

Italian

Etymology

Latin strictus, perfective passive participle of stringere

Pronunciation

IPA: /'stret:o/

Adjective

it-adj strett

1. narrow
2. tight
3. strict
4. close

Derived terms

• caffè stretto

Antonyms

• largo

Noun

1. strait

Related terms

• stretta
• strettezza
• strettire
• strettoia
• strettoio
• strettura

Verb

stretto ( stretta, p stretti, strette)

1. past participle of stringere

Stretto (plural: stretti), from the Italian stringere "to draw close" is a musical term for when a fugue motif is used to accompany itself. For example, if the alto voice begins the subject before the soprano voice has completed its prior entry of the subject, that is a stretto.

A stretto is most often used to intensify the contrapuntal density of a piece, often signifying arrival at the fugue's conclusion, as seen in Johann Sebastian Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier Book I, Fugue No. 1 (External Shockwave movie). In other instances stretto serves to display contrapuntal inventiveness, as in the E Major fugue (External Shockwave movie) from WTC Book II, where Bach follows a traditional exposition (subject accompanied by countersubject) with a counterexposition in which the subject accompanies itself, in stretto, followed by the countersubject accompanying itself.

When written as an expressive mark in a piece, "stretto" indicates a temporary accelerando or hastening forward, as in measure 227 of Chopin's third ballade, and measures 16 and 17 of his Prelude no. 4 in e minor.

See also

• Music theory
• Fugue