Attacco, in music, indicates a short phrase, treated as a point of imitation; and employed, either as the subject of a fugue, as a subordinate element introduced for the purpose of increasing the interest of its development, as a leading feature in a motet, madrigal, full anthem, or other choral composition, or as a means of relieving the monotony of an otherwise too homogeneous part-song. The name comes from the Italian attaccare, "to unite" or "to bind together." A striking instance of an attacco used as the subject of a fugue is J. S. Bach's The Well-Tempered Clavier, No. 27.