The Venetian polychoral style was a type of music of the late Renaissance and early Baroque eras which involved spatially separate choirs singing in alternation.

The style arose in Northern Italian churches in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and proved to be a good fit for the architectural peculiarities of the imposing Basilica San Marco di Venezia in Venice.

[2] This was a rare but interesting case of the architectural peculiarities of a single building encouraging the proliferation of a style which had become popular all over Europe, and helped define the shift from the Renaissance to the Baroque era.

Gabrieli seems to have been the first to specify instruments in his published works, including large choirs of cornetti and sackbuts; he also seems to be one of the earliest to specify dynamics (as in his Sonata pian' e forte), and to develop the "echo" effects for which he became famous.

The fame of the spectacular, sonorous music of San Marco at this time spread across Europe, and numerous musicians came to Venice to hear, to study, to absorb and bring back what they learned to their countries of origin.