cantata
noun
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A cantata is a work for voice or voices and instruments of the baroque era. From its beginnings in 17th-century Italy, both secular and religious cantatas were written. The earliest cantatas were generally for solo voice with minimal instrumental accompaniment. Cantatas soon developed a dramatic character and alternating sections of recitative (solo singing that imitates the rhythms and tones of speech) and aria, paralleling the simultaneous development of opera. In Germany, the Lutheran cantata almost always involved a chorus. The approximately 200 cantatas written by Johann Sebastian Bach are the most celebrated. After ca. 1750 the cantata gradually declined.
Examples of cantata in a Sentence
Hannah Edgar, Chicago Tribune, 16 Aug. 2025
Symphony San Jose is presenting the cantata in partnership with several Chinese American organizations, promising a performance of grandeur and a call for peace in the world.
—Randy McMullen, Mercury News, 14 Aug. 2025
More than just capitalizing on the then-new compact disc format, the packages declared that these were substantial artists with catalogs that deserve the same respect a classical label would give to Bach’s cantatas.
—David Browne, Rolling Stone, 10 Jan. 2025
Johann Sebastian Bach's works were an ideal choice given the highly mathematical structure, plus the composer was so prolific, across so many very different kinds of musical compositions—preludes, fugues, chorales, toccatas, concertos, suites, and cantatas—as to allow for useful comparisons.
—Ars Technica, 30 Dec. 2024
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Cite this Entry
“Cantata.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/cantata. Accessed 3 Nov. 2025.
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cantata
noun
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