CODA, in music, a term for a passage which brings a move ment or a separate piece to a conclusion. (Ital. for "tail" ; from the Lat. cauda.) This developed from the simple chords of a cadence into what is often an elaborate and important feature of a composition on a large scale. Beethoven raised the "coda" to a feature of the highest importance. A codetta (diminutive of coda) is merely a small coda, employed to round off, not a com plete work, but an intermediate section of it.