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Recitative (, also known by its Italian name recitativo () is a style of delivery (much used in , , and ) in which a singer is allowed to adopt the rhythms and delivery of ordinary speech. Recitative does not repeat lines as formally composed songs do. It resembles sung ordinary speech more than a formal musical composition.
Recitative can be distinguished on a continuum from more speech-like to more musically sung, with more sustained melodic lines. The mostly syllabic recitativo secco ("dry", accompanied only by Basso continuo, typically cello and harpsichord) is at one end of the spectrum, through recitativo accompagnato (using orchestra), the more arioso, and finally the full-blown aria or ensemble, where the pulse is entirely governed by the music. Secco recitatives can be more improvisatory and free for the singer, since the accompaniment is so sparse; in contrast, when recitative is accompanied by orchestra, the singer must perform in a more structured way.
The term recitative (or occasionally liturgical recitative) is also applied to the simpler formulas of Gregorian chant, such as the tones used for the epistle, gospel, preface and ; see accentus.
In the Baroque music era, recitatives were commonly rehearsed on their own by the stage director, the singers frequently supplying their own favourite insertion aria which might be by a different composer (some of Mozart's so-called concert arias fall into this category). This division of labour persisted into the 19th century: Rossini's La Cenerentola (1817, recitatives by Luca AgoliniGossett 2006, p. 249) is a famous example. Later it remained a custom to replace originally spoken dialogue with new recitatives: Carl Maria von Weber's Der Freischütz (1821, adapted 1841 with recitatives by Hector Berlioz for the Paris Opera), Georges Bizet's Carmen (1875, recitatives by Ernest Guiraud for the posthumous run in Vienna the same year), Charles Gounod's Mireille and La colombe (staged by Sergei Diaghilev with recitatives respectively by Eric Satie and Francis PoulencJ. S. Lessner: '"Gounod: Ear for Melody" in Opera News, May 2021).
In the early operas and cantatas of the Florentine school, secco recitatives were accompanied by a variety of instruments, mostly plucked fretted strings including the chitarrone, often with a pipe organ to provide sustained tone. Later, in the operas of Antonio Vivaldi and Handel, the accompaniment was standardised as a harpsichord and a bass viol or violoncello. When the harpsichord was gradually phased out over the late 18th century, and mostly disappeared in the early 19th century, many opera-houses did not replace it with the fortepiano, a hammered-string keyboard invented in 1700.
Instead the violoncello was left to carry on alone, or with reinforcement from a double bass. A 1919 recording of Rossini's Barber of Seville, issued by La voce del padrone, gives a unique glimpse of this technique in action, as do cello methods of the period and some scores of Meyerbeer. There are examples of the revival of the harpsichord for this purpose as early as the 1890s (e.g. by Hans Richter for a production of Mozart's Don Giovanni at the London Royal Opera House, the instrument being supplied by Arnold Dolmetsch), but it was not until the 1950s that the 18th-century method was consistently observed once more. In the 2010s, the early music revival movement has led to the re-introduction of harpsichord in some Baroque music performances.
Sometimes a distinction is made between the more dramatic, expressive, or interjecting 'orchestral recitative' ( recitativo obbligato or stromentato) and a more passive and sustained 'accompanied recitative' ( recitativo accompagnato).
Recitative is also occasionally used in Musical theatre, being put to ironic use in the finale of Kurt Weill's The Threepenny Opera. It also appears in Carousel and Of Thee I Sing.
George Gershwin used it in his opera Porgy and Bess, though sometimes the recitative in that work is changed to spoken dialogue. Porgy and Bess has also been staged as a musical rather than as an opera.
Ludwig van Beethoven used the instrumental recitative in at least three works, including Piano Sonata No. 17 ( The Tempest), Piano Sonata No. 31, and in the opening section of the Finale of his Ninth Symphony. Here, Beethoven inscribed on the score (in French) "In the manner of a recitative, but in tempo." Leon Plantinga argues that the second movement of Beethoven's Fourth Piano Concerto is also an instrumental recitative,Plantinga 1996, p. 186 although Owen Jander interprets it as a dialogue.Jander 1985, pp. 195–212
Other Romantic music composers to employ instrumental recitative include Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov (who composed a lyrical, virtuosic recitative for solo violin with harp accompaniment to represent the Scheherazade in his orchestral Scheherazade) and Hector Berlioz (whose choral symphony Roméo et Juliette contains a trombone recitative as part of its Introduction).
Arnold Schoenberg labeled the last of his Five Pieces for Orchestra, Op. 16, as " Das obligate Rezitativ", and also composed a piece for organ, Variations on a Recitative, Op. 40. Other examples of instrumental recitative in twentieth century music include the third movement of Douglas Moore's Quintet for Clarinet and Strings (1946), the first of Richard Rodney Bennett's Five for guitar (1968), the opening section of the last movement of Benjamin Britten's String Quartet No. 3 (1975), and the second of William Bolcom's 12 New Etudes for Piano (1977–86).
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