CHOIR. — With the term χορός the Greeks originally designated the assembly of dancers who sang the dithyramb around the altar of Dionysus; later the term came to indicate the song that accompanied the dances, and then also the place where the dances took place. The same development occurred in parallel among Christians. The term chorus encompassed: the group of singers, the sacred song, and the place where the singers performed their chant.
I. SONG
At the outset the choir of the faithful chanted psalms and sang in responsorial or antiphonal form, that is, they recited the verses of the psalms and intoned hymns and canticles in praise of God, either by responding to the praecantor (lead singer) or by alternating, on the same recitation or melody, their voices with those of another choir, ending together with an acclamation or a dossolga. However, antiphonal singing, commonly called choral singing, became established only toward the end of the 3rd century or the beginning of the 4th in the Eastern Church, and from the East it then spread to the West; but, deriving from ancient times from the synagogue, it must have already existed in the time of St. Ignatius (early 2nd century), growing in importance as the liturgical needs of Christianity increased after the Edict of Constantine (313). Even in the 3rd and 4th centuries the “innoia” (choral singing of hymns) gained ground as a formidable weapon against heresy, which had first used the same means, well-suited to appeal to the faithful because of its simple strophic structure and its new, more accessible rhythmic conception (accentual meter). After the definitive arrangement given by St. Gregory the Great, choral singing began its slow and difficult, though ultimately (11th century) victorious, penetration across Europe. Yet by the 9th century symptoms of a crisis in choral singing had already appeared, marking the beginning of the decline of sacred music itself. The principal causes are to be sought, on the one hand, in the practice of “ diaphony” and its subsequent developments (discant, counterpoint, and grand polyphony), and on the other, in the introduction of instruments, already begun (8th–9th centuries) with the use of the organ in church. Organum or diaphony (late 9th century), that is, assigning to one of the two choirs the functions of the organ as an instrument, following the principal melody in fourths or fifths, represented the first step toward a more refined and aristocratic choral style, which in subsequent forms attained greater complexity and difficulty of execution. In discant (v.) and counterpoint, the place was then given to a limited number of specialist singers. If we add that with the barbarian invasions the people forgot how to speak Latin and thus drifted away from the liturgical language, giving rise to a flourishing of vernacular songs, and moreover that with the advent of Humanism and the Renaissance the sense of the profane was accentuated, we shall have a fairly complete picture of the conditions in which religious choral art found itself until Palestrina (1525–1594). Counterpoint passed from the Flemish and France to all of Europe and culminated in grand polyphony, which in reality represented an external intensification of religious faith at the expense, generally, of the interiority proper to the primitive monodic Christian chant (Gregorian or cantus firmus) to which the liturgy had remained faithful. Yet with Palestrina we still have proof of how polyphonic (diatonic) choral music could be reconciled with the liturgical requirements of the Church, and at the same time as him, and even before, we can see signs of a renewed choral spirit in G. Okeghem (restorer of the a cappella style in contrast to the then long-established practice of instrumental support and reductions), Josquin Des Prez, Orlando di Lasso, A. Willaert (who renewed in Venice at St. Mark’s the two antiphonal choirs in the ancient manner), A. and G. Gabrieli, etc. As we approach modern times, choral music increasingly confuses the religious element with the profane and invades especially the concert hall and the theater. Choirs of instruments and choirs of human voices balance each other in importance; even in church the same occurs, and the former sometimes even replaces the latter.
In Italy notable examples appear in the 14th century; thus the choir of the cathedral of Orvieto, begun in 1325, designed by Giovanni Ammannati of Siena, and executed by Lorenzo di Accorso, Giovanni Talini, Meuccio Nuti, and others; the lateral stalls of the cathedral of Siena (1363–97) by Francesco del Tonghio, his son Jacopo, and other masters; the choir of S. Domenico in Ferrara by Giovanni da Baiso. From the 15th century date: the choir of the cathedral of Pienza, adorned with Gothic arches supported by twisted columns; that of the chapel of the Palazzo Pubblico in Siena, by Domenico di Niccolò (1428), inlaid and carved with representations alluding to the Creed, still Gothic in style; that of the lower church of S. Francesco in Assisi, by Apollonio di Giovanni Petroccchi of Ripatransone (1471), Gothic in style, carved and inlaid; that of S. Maria Nuova in Perugia, carved in the Gothic style by Paolino da Ascoli and Giovanni da Montelparo (1456). Domenico Indivini of S. Severino is the author of the choir of the upper church of S. Francesco in Assisi (1491–1501); Giangiacomo Genevose completed in 1471 the choir of the archiepiscopal sacristy of the cathedral of Piacenza, derived from the art of Giovanni da Baiso; the Canozzi of Lendinara carved the choir of the cathedral of Parma. Also cited are the choirs of the cathedrals of Reggio Emilia, from the school of Giovanni da Baiso; that of S. Prospero in the same city; that of S. Sisto in Piacenza; that of S. Zeno in Verona; that of the Frari in Venice, a work, like that of S. Stefano in Venice, by Marco da Vicenza. Echoes of French art resound in Piedmont throughout the 15th century: notable is the choir of the cathedral of Aosta, by Giovanni Vion of Samoens and Giovanni di Chetro, whose dorsal panels are adorned with bas-reliefs representing apostles, prophets, and saints; equally noteworthy is that of the collegiate church of S. Orsola in the same city, by Pietro Mochet of Geneva, with Gothic-style dorsal panels and bas-reliefs with apostles and prophets, seats and armrests with small figures of monks, warriors, animals, and hunting scenes. Also recorded in Piedmont are the choirs of S. Giovanni in Asti; the cathedral of Susa, a work of Balbino di Suro of Pavia (1477); and the abbey of Staffarda, now in the Civic Museum of Turin.
Intarsia, already found in the 14th century, developed widely in the following century, especially in Umbria and Tuscany. Giuliano da Maiano and Domenico del Tasso decorated with saints and ornamental motifs the choir of the cathedral of Perugia (1486–91).
while the term is used indifferently to designate either. In G. Gabrieli the choral apparatus accompanied by instruments reaches, at certain moments, no less than 16 voices; O. Benevoli (17th century) gathers the imposing mass of voices divided into 12 choirs with accompaniment by a full orchestra supported by 2 organs. The meaning that each individual part of each choir had previously is now become quite secondary, and while the instrument emancipates itself from the role of accompaniment and fully develops instrumental music (17th and 18th centuries) and symphonic music (18th-19th centuries), vocal music is directed mostly toward melodrama (18th-19th centuries). From Bach the choir is still felt in the function of a religious spirit; but in Beethoven and then in the Romantics in general, as today in contemporary composers, almost all choral production now concerns itself with the sacred, now with the profane, and confuses the two together. Nevertheless, from the mid-19th century, the movement for the restoration of sacred music begun in Germany and subsequently spread throughout Europe and the United States, has triumphantly brought back to light Gregorian and polyphonic choral art, subject to careful study and repeated performances (L. Perosi, I. Pizzetti, A. Honneger, Z. Kodály).
RENZO BONVICINI
CHOIR (LITURGY AND ART). — By choir (c.) is meant that part of the presbytery which, depending on the position of the high altar, is located either in front of or behind II. The choir is always assigned the apse (v.); however, the choir may, for particular reasons, also be found in another space, such as in side chapels (winter choir, summer choir). The choir is always equipped with stalls or seats from which the secular or regular clergy take part in the liturgy. The stalls are often among the most notable products of the art of woodwork. The modern choir combines in itself the elements of the ancient schola cantorum (v.), where the singers gathered, to whom the choir loft (v.) is now assigned.
Fra' Giovanni da Verona completes in 1515 with admirable art the inlaying of the stalls of the church of Monte Oliveto Maggiore, representing birds, fountains, views, still lifes. And inlays are found in the church of Badia in Florence, in the cathedral of Todi, where Antonio and Sebastiano Bencivenni da Mercatello work, in S. Maria in Organo in Verona, in the cathedrals of Genoa and Savona. The choir of the Certosa of Pavia presents carvings by Bartolomeo De Poli and inlays by Pietro da Vailate with figures of saints; that of S. Maria Maggiore in Bergamo, inlays by Francesco Capodiferro on cartoons by Lorenzo Lotto (Judith and Holofernes, David and Goliath, The Entry into the Ark, The Crossing of the Red Sea), by Moretto and others.
Carving reasserts itself advantageously over inlay in S. Maria delle Carceri in Prato, in S. Pietro in Perugia, in S. Anastasia in Verona. In the cathedral of Siena the central stalls are by Bartolomeo Neroni, called il Riccio, in which are seen added inlays by fra' Giovanni da Verona, coming from the destroyed church of S. Benedetto.
Still in the 16th century, mention may be made of the choirs of S. Sebastiano in Biella, of S. Giustina in Padua, of S. Giorgio Maggiore in Venice, etc.
In the 17th and 18th centuries the choirs become sumptuous and elaborate according to the common tendencies of the time; one recalls the choir in the canons' chapel in S. Pietro in Vaticano; that, unfortunately destroyed, of the abbey of Montecassino by G. A. Coliccio, richly carved; that of S. Domenico in Lucera, by Fabrizio Junulo da Monopoli, who carved the figures of Christ at the Column and of saints in the dorsal panels; that of the church of S. Sigismondo in Verona, by G. Capra; of the parish church of Mosso S. Maria, with lively elegant ornamentation; of S. Maria di Moncalieri, carved with refined elegance. Among the carvers of this period Andrea Fontoni da Rovetta excels, author of the choir of the church of Sorisole (Bergamo), with images of saints within niches and other decorative figures.
Outside Italy mention is made of the stalls of the cathedral of Amiens, begun in 1598; in Germany the choir of the cathedral of Ulm; in Spain those of the cathedral of Seville, by Nufo Sanchez and the Fleming Dancart (ca. 1478), of the cathedral of León by Teodorico Tedesco (1481), of the cathedral of Palencia by Pietro di Guadalupa (1519), of the cathedral of Toledo by Rodrigo Alemán, the Biguerry and A. Berruguete; in Portugal the stalls of S. Croce of Imbra and of the church of the convent of Belem.
Among modern works mention may be made of the stalls in the church of the Immacolata in Genoa, inlaid with ivory and metals. — See plates XXIV-XXV.