Cantata

//kənˈtɑːtə// noun

noun ·Uncommon ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    A vocal composition accompanied by instruments and generally containing more than one movement, typical of 17th and 18th century Italian music.
  2. 2
    a musical composition for voices and orchestra based on a religious text wordnet

Example

More examples

"The word “cantata” is so flexible and covers such a wide area in music, that it has been a work of some difficulty to decide upon the compositions that properly come within the scheme of this volume."

Etymology

From Italian cantata. Doublet of chanty.

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.