Stretto

The Italian term stretto [ˈstretto] (plural: stretti) has two distinct meanings in music:

  1. In a fugue, stretto (German: Engführung) is the imitation of the subject in close succession, so that the answer enters before the subject is completed.
  2. In non-fugal compositions, a stretto (also sometimes spelled stretta) is a passage, often at the end of an aria or movement, in faster tempo. Examples include the end of Franz Liszt's transcendental etude No.10, the end of the last movement of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony; measure 227 of Chopin's Ballade No. 3; measures 16-18 of his Prelude No. 4 in E minor; and measure 26 of his Etude Op. 10, No. 12, "The Revolutionary."