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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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

  • slur A curved line drawn over or under a series of notes, indicating that those notes should be played legato.
  • relative key The major and minor keys that share the same key signature.
  • world music A 20th century term used by the music recording industry to categorize non-American music that does not fit into any of the established genres. This music tends to be folk music from outside of the United States of America.
  • allargando [Italian] Growing broader, slowing down.
  • Rinaldi numbers A numbering system identifying compositions by Antonio Vivaldi.
  • da capo aria [Italian] A lyric song in A-B-A form, commonly found in operas, cantatas and oratorios.
  • rastrum [Latin] A pen that has five points (nibs), for use in notating staff lines.
  • bluegrass A form of American country music, inspired by the music of immigrants from the United Kingdom and Ireland as well as jazz and blues. In bluegrass, as in jazz, each instrument takes its turn playing the melody and improvising around it, while the others perform accompaniment.
  • downbeat The first beat of a measure, the strongest in any meter.
  • ballade [French] A one-movement musical piece with lyrical and dramatic narrative qualities, usually having a text dealing with courtly love.
  • rustico [Italian] Rustic, rural.
  • lentamente [Italian] Slowly.
  • sonata da chiesa [Italian] A baroque instrumental work intended for performance in a church, generally in four movements, arranged slow, fast, slow, fast.
  • prestissimo [Italian] Extremely fast tempo marking, usually around 200 BPM.
  • fusion Style that combines jazz improvisation with amplified instruments of rock.