''Barzelletta'' (''lit.'' "jest") was a popular verse form used by ''

frottola The frottola (; plural frottole) was the predominant type of Italian popular secular song of the late fifteenth and early sixteenth century. It was the most important and widespread predecessor to the madrigal. The peak of activity in compositio ...

'' composers in

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...

in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. It is generally

trochaic In English poetic metre and modern linguistics, a trochee () is a metrical foot consisting of a stressed syllable followed by an unstressed one. But in Latin and Ancient Greek poetic metre, a trochee is a heavy syllable followed by a light one (al ...

, with eight syllables per line. The ''barzelletta'' consists of two sections: a ''reprisa'' which is four rhyming lines (

rhyme scheme A rhyme scheme is the pattern of rhymes at the end of each line of a poem or song. It is usually referred to by using letters to indicate which lines rhyme; lines designated with the same letter all rhyme with each other. An example of the ABAB r ...

ABBA or ABAB), a stanza, and a ''volta''. The ''barzelletta'' tends to be lively and dance-like, with heavy accents on cadences.

Don Harrán Don Harran (also spelled Harrán, ebrew דון חרן 22 April 1936 – 15 June 2016) was professor of musicology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Biography Born Donald Lee Hersh in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Don Harrán did his undergradua ...

. "Barzelletta", '' Grove Music Online'', ed. L. Macy (accessed September 15, 2006)
grovemusic.com
(subscription access).

References

{{Reflist 16th-century music genres Song forms