Chamber music (Topical Term)

New Harvard dict. of music (consort: a composition for an instrumental ensemble, usually of two to eight players)

New Grove dict. of mus. online, Dec. 4, 2002 (To limit the term to instrumental ensemble repertory, for example, is to exclude such hybrid works as Schubert's Der Hirt auf dem Felsen and Vaughan Williams's On Wenlock Edge and to bypass such vocal genres as 16th-century madrigals and 19th-century lieder which share many of the characteristics of chamber music.)

Here are entered miscellaneous collections of chamber music for various combinations of two through nine solo instruments or voices with instrumental accompaniment.

Collections for the same combination of solo performers, and individual works, are entered under headings specifying the medium of performance, e.g. Bassoon music (Bassoons (2)); Duets (Unspecified instruments (2)); String quartets; Suites (Bassoon, clarinet, trombone, violin); Vocal quartets with instrumental ensemble.