Chorale setting

A chorale is a simple melody, often based on Gregorian chant, written for congregations to sing hymns.

Although the bulk of them are German in origin, and predominantly baroque in style, chorale settings span many countries and musical periods.

Plainchant, associated with the Catholic Church, was largely replaced with choral music sung in the vernacular language—usually German—and the corresponding musical forms from Catholic countries, such as the motet, were replaced with forms that used as their basis the chorales instead of the plainsong from which much of the motet repertory was derived.

These chorales were set musically in an extraordinary number of ways, from the time of the Protestant Reformation to the present day.

Chorale settings are of the following principal types: Boundaries between different items on this list can be vague, especially in the early Baroque.