Multilingual Music Glossary

# A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

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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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Some random terms

  • armonioso [Italian] Harmonious, pleasant-sounding.
  • placido [Italian] Calm, placid.
  • reel Moderately quick dance in duple meter danced throughout the British Isles; the most popular Irish traditional dance type.
  • symphony In the early 18th century, any instrumental prelude, interlude, or postlude. In modern usage, the term is applied to a large composition for orchestra, generally in three or four movements. The symphony may also be defined as a sonata for orchestra.
  • species counterpoint A technique of strict counterpoint involving the addition of voices to a melody advancing from simple to more complex harmonies.
  • lebhaft [German] Lively.
  • courante [French] A family of triple meter dances from the late Renaissance and the Baroque era.
  • root The fundamental note of a chord.
  • post-modern A term adopted around the mid-1970s to describe our current eclectic, experimental age.
  • ostinato [Italian] Literally, “obstinate”. A short melodic, rhythmic, or harmonic pattern that is repeated throughout a composition.
  • timbre [French] The quality of a sound; that component of a tone that causes different instruments (for example a flute and a violin) to sound different from each other while they are both playing the same note.
  • grand staff A combination of two staves with a brace, usually used for piano music.
  • da capo aria [Italian] A lyric song in A-B-A form, commonly found in operas, cantatas and oratorios.
  • cantus firmus [Latin] “Fixed melody”, usually of very long notes, often based on a fragment of Gregorian chant that served as the structural basis for a polyphonic composition, particularly in the Renaissance.
  • nocturne [French] A composition to be played at night in the open air. Also used by composers for piano and orchestral pieces that suggest some aspect of the night and are usually solemn and contemplative.