Toccata Toccata Toccata (from Italian "toccare", literally, "to touch") is a virtuoso piece of music typically for a keyboard or plucked string instrument featuring fast-moving, lightly fingered or otherwise virtuosic passages or sections, with or without imitative or fugal interludes, generally emphasizing the dexterity of the performer's fingers. Less frequently, the name is applied to works for multiple instruments (the opening of Claudio Monteverdi's opera "L'Orfeo" being a notable example). The form first appeared in the late Renaissance period. It originated in northern Italy. Several publications of the 1590s include toccatas, by composers such as Claudio Merulo, Andrea and Giovanni Gabrieli,
Toccata for Percussion Instruments (Chávez) word "toccata" in its original sense, using its root meaning of "toccare", or "to touch", which he used to display the various touches an artist can give a performance, rather the different lyrical shades. For the U.S premier, during which the composer himself conducted the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Chávez wrote in the program notes that "The Toccata was written as an experiment in orthodox percussion instruments – those used regularly in symphony orchestras, that is, avoiding the exotic and the picturesque. Therefore it relies on its purely musical expression and formalistic structure." The first and last movements of the three-movement