Orchestration
Instrument Ranges for Arrangers: Playable, Comfortable, Usable
A playable range and a usable register are different facts. Transposition arithmetic, endurance, doubling, and the notes that are another instrument.
Tessitura
The part of a voice or instrument's range where most notes lie and where the performer sounds most comfortable.
Also called: tessiture, comfortable range, central range
Tessitura is the part of a singer's or instrument's range where most of the notes lie, and where it sounds and feels most comfortable. A range may run from low to high, but the tessitura is the central band a line spends its time in. A soprano part whose notes mostly sit between A4 and A5 is high in tessitura, even if it reaches a higher note only once. Composers and arrangers check tessitura when they write for a voice, because a passage high in tessitura tires the singer over time, even when each individual note lies within range. Tessitura is an Italian term used for voices and instruments alike. It describes where the line lives, which matters more to performance than the extreme notes.
Related terms
- RangeThe span from the lowest to the highest note a voice or instrument can sound, or the notes a written part uses.
- Transposing instrumentAn instrument whose written notes sound at a different pitch, such as a B♭ clarinet, which sounds a major second lower.