A due in

Italian Italian(s) may refer to: * Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries ** Italians, a Romance ethnic group related to or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom ** Italian language, a Romance languag ...

or à deux in

French French may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to France ** French language, which originated in France ** French people, a nation and ethnic group ** French cuisine, cooking traditions and practices Arts and media * The French (band), ...

is a musical direction meaning "for two". Most often seen in its abbreviated form ''a2'', the marking signifies that on a staff that normally carries parts for two players, both players are to play the single part in

unison Unison (stylised as UNISON) is a Great Britain, British trade union. Along with Unite the Union, Unite, Unison is one of the two largest trade unions in the United Kingdom, with over 1.2 million members who work predominantly in public servic ...

.Randel, Don Michael (ed.). ''Harvard Concise Dictionary of Music and Musicians.'' Cambridge, London: 1999. It is generally seen in scores and parts where two players or sections of the same instrument share a staff. The instruction ''a2'' indicates that both players or sections should play the notes indicated, while ''primo'' and ''secondo'' (often abbreviated to ''1.'' and ''2.'' or ''I^o'' and ''II^o'') indicate that only a single player or section should play while the other remains

tacet Tacet is Latin which translates literally into English as "(it) is silent" (pronounced: , , or ). It is a musical term to indicate that an instrument or voice does not sound, also known as a rest. In vocal polyphony and in orchestral scores, it ...

. Increasingly larger groups of players can also be indicated in a similar manner, for instance "a3" for three players ("a tre" in Italian, "à trois" in French), "a4" for four players ("a quattro" in Italian, "à quatre" in French), and so on. For orchestral strings, playing in unison is usually assumed, but if returning to unison from a

divisi In musical terminology, ''divisi'', or as typically printed ''“div.,”'' is an instruction to divide a single section of instruments into multiple subsections. This usually applies to the violins of the string section in an orchestra, although v ...

passage, "unison" (or "unis.") is traditionally used to indicate this. If returning from a solo string passage (in which only a single string player in a section is performing), "tutti" is used to indicate that the whole ensemble should play once again.

References

Musical notation {{music-theory-stub

See also

References