A Dictionary of Music and Musicians/Figured

FIGURED. A translation of Figurato, another word for Florid. Figured Counterpoint is where several notes of various lengths, with syncopations and other ornamental devices, are set against the single notes of the Canto fermo; and Figured melody, or Canto figurato, was the breaking up of the long notes of the church melodies into larger or more rapid figures or passages. The figurirter Choral, or Figured chorale, of the German school was a similar treatment of their church tunes, in which either the melody itself or its accompaniments are broken up into 'figures' or groups of smaller notes than the original. Of this numberless examples may be found in the works of J. S. Bach.