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

  • presto [Italian] Fast tempo marking, usually around 168–192 BPM.
  • custos [Latin] (Plural: custodes.) A symbol that appears at the end of a staff line with a single voice). It anticipates the first note of the following line and thus helps the player or singer to manage line breaks during performance. Custodes were frequently used until the 16th century.
  • repercussion The frequent repetition of the same sound. Also, the re-entrance of the subject and answer in a fugue following other material.
  • eclogue A rustic poem usually having to do with shepherds, springtime and love. In Romantic piano music, a light, lyrical, uncomplicated composition.
  • semitone A minor second; the smallest interval in the system of Western music.
  • minstrel A court musician or entertainer of the 12th through 17th centuries who performed professionally.
  • bridge A passage connecting two sections of a composition.
  • sentimento [Italian] Feeling, emotion.
  • andantino [Italian] A moderate tempo marking, which can be faster or slower than andante.
  • syncopation Deliberate upsetting of the meter or pulse of a composition by means of a temporary shifting of the accent to a weak beat.
  • new age Style of popular music of the 1980s and 1990s, characterized by soothing timbres and repetitive forms that are subjected to shifting variation techniques.
  • tenerezza [Italian] Tenderness.
  • tranquillo [Italian] Calm, quiet.
  • head joint The top section of a flute, with the tone hole where the player initiates the sound by blowing air across the opening.
  • Tzigane [French] Term used for a composition having gypsy influences or flavor.