Stretto Totally Explained

Everything about Stretto totally explained

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's 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.

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