music Music is the arrangement of sound to create some combination of Musical form, form, harmony, melody, rhythm, or otherwise Musical expression, expressive content. Music is generally agreed to be a cultural universal that is present in all hum ...

, tessitura ( , , ; ; ) is the most acceptable and comfortable vocal range for a given singer (or, less frequently,

musical instrument A musical instrument is a device created or adapted to make Music, musical sounds. In principle, any object that produces sound can be considered a musical instrument—it is through purpose that the object becomes a musical instrument. A person ...

). It is the range in which a given type of voice presents its best-sounding (or characteristic)

timbre In music, timbre (), also known as tone color or tone quality (from psychoacoustics), is the perceived sound of a musical note, sound or tone. Timbre distinguishes sounds according to their source, such as choir voices and musical instrument ...

. This broad definition is often interpreted to refer specifically to the pitch range that most frequently occurs within a given part of a musical piece. Hence, in

musical notation Musical notation is any system used to visually represent music. Systems of notation generally represent the elements of a piece of music that are considered important for its performance in the context of a given musical tradition. The proce ...

, ''tessitura'' is the ambitus, or a narrower part of it, in which that particular vocal (or less often instrumental) part lies—whether high or low, etc. However, the tessitura of a part or voice is not decided by the extremes of its range, but rather by the share of this total range which is most used. Hence, it is referred to as the "heart" of a range. For example, throughout the entirety of Wagner's '' Ring'', the music written for the

tenor A tenor is a type of male singing voice whose vocal range lies between the countertenor and baritone voice types. It is the highest male chest voice type. Composers typically write music for this voice in the range from the second B below m ...

role of Siegfried ranges from C to C, but the tessitura is described as high because the phrases are most often in the range of C to A. Furthermore, the tessitura concept addresses not merely a range of pitches but also the arrangement of those pitches. The particular melodic contour of a singer's part may also be considered to be an important aspect of his vocal ''tessitura''. Tessitura considerations include these factors: proportion of sudden or gradual rises and falls in pitch—speed of pitch changes; the relative number of very high or low notes; whether lines and phrases of music in the piece tend to rise or fall—the muscular abilities of a singer may be more suited to one or the other direction. A singer's ideal tessitura is centered on the single pitch in which their dynamic range is greatest. The extension to the more particular "weaving" of a voice has led to a commixture of tessitura and

voice type A voice type is a classification of the human singing voice into perceivable categories or groups. Particular human singing human voice, voices are identified as having certain qualities or characteristics of vocal range, vocal weight, tessitura ...

. For example, the volume ( loudness) that a singer is able to maintain for dramatic effect will often influence which '' Fach'' (voice type) or tessitura they specialize in. For example, a lyric tenor may have the vocal range to sing Wagner or other dramatic roles, but to maintain the loudness required for dramatic intensity over the span of an opera performance could either inflict vocal damage or be beyond his ability.

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