Choral concerto

The choral concerto (Russian: хоровой концерт, romanized: khorovoy kontsert, Ukrainian: Хоровий концерт, romanized: khorovyi kontsert), occasionally known as vocal concerto or church concerto) is a genre of sacred music which arose in the Russian Empire in the middle of the seventeenth century and remained popular into the early nineteenth century. Choral concertos are short compositions for unaccompanied voices, typically containing multiple and distinct sections, with occasional soloistic interludes. The text of the compositions was usually selected from the psalms and other biblical texts, with occasional settings from feast day sequences. Choral concertos were intended for liturgical use; they were sung at the point in the Divine Liturgy when clergy were taking Holy Communion, before the Communion of the faithful.