Multilingual Music Glossary

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Found a word you don't know? No problem. Look it up in the Music Glossary!

We are currently providing explanations for 2484 terms from 12 languages, including English, Italian, French, German, Spanish, Dutch, Swedish, Finnish, Latin…

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Please note: a music glossary is just like a dictionary. It contains explanations to musical terms. If you are looking for a piece, please go here instead: search tunes.

Some random terms

  • liturgy In those churches that use standard written forms of services, the ritual or service of public worship.
  • affabile [Italian] Affable, pleasant.
  • tuning The adjustment of the pitch of an instrument. Also, the set pitches to which an instrument is tuned.
  • tardo [Italian] Slow.
  • symphonie concertante [French] A musical genre of the late 18th and early 19th centuries that resembles a concerto for two to four solo instruments. It is a composition in two or three movements of a lighthearted character, usually in a major key. The genre features a few solo instruments and orchestra.
  • compound interval An interval greater than an octave.
  • paraphrase In the Renaissance, a melody borrowed from another source (usually chant) and then elaborated freely. In the 19th century, a virtuoso composition using popular melodies, usually from operas, in an elaborated manner.
  • diabolus in musica [Latin] Literally, “the devil in music”. A medieval name for the tritone.
  • downbeat The first beat of a measure, the strongest in any meter.
  • clos [French] The second ending of a repeated section.
  • ritardando [Italian] Gradually delaying the tempo.
  • sight-reading The practice of playing or singing a composition at sight, without previous preparation.
  • haut [French] Literally, “high”. Medieval category of loud instruments, used principally for outdoor occasions.
  • alborada [Spanish] Literally, “dawn”. Lively instrumental composition to be played at daybreak, usually in 6/8 time.
  • whole note The note with the longest duration in currently used Western music notation.