Glossary of Notation

Vocal music performed without instrumental accompaniment.

"For two" – two instruments play the same part.

Sight-read, performed without prior rehearsal.

Return to the original tempo after a deviation.

Shorthand symbol used to simplify recurring figures.

Closing section of the medieval bar form AAB.

Ability to identify pitches exactly without a reference tone.

Gradual increase in tempo, abbr. accel.

Very short crushed grace note written as a slashed flagged note.

Prescribed standard tuning of a stringed instrument.

At will, in tempo and instrumentation.

Slightly less slow than adagio.

Very slow, extremely sustained.

Church mode on A, identical to the natural minor.

To be performed with tender feeling.

Small tempo fluctuations used to enliven a performance.

Brace joining multiple staves together.

Successive playing of the tones of a chord.

Hand-held bellows instrument with keys.

Study of the physical behavior of sound.

"To the end" – instruction to play through to the close.

Fade away until inaudible.

Keyboard accompaniment pattern of broken triads.

Compositional principle using deliberate chance elements.

In the manner of a march.

Broadening, growing gradually slower.

Very fast, almost prestissimo.

Fast, lively, cheerful.

Alpine natural-tone horn up to four metres long.

Chromatic alteration of a chord tone.

Chord containing raised or lowered tones.

C clef placed on the third line of the staff.

High male voice, countertenor.

Plagal cadence IV–I, typical at the end of chorales.

To be performed lovingly, tenderly.

Longer subject of a fugue.

Slightly faster than andante.

Stylised English dance found in the Baroque suite.

Becoming animated, growing faster.

Animated, with verve.

First phrase of a musical period.

Performed in alternation between two sound groups.

"Open" first ending in medieval music.

Long accented grace note that takes half the value of the main note.

Ornate character piece or figure.

"With the bow"; cancels pizzicato.

Lyrical, expressive vocal style between aria and recitative.

Broken chord played harp-like from low to high.

Upbeat in the rhythmic rise and fall of a measure.

Clearly articulated.

"Very"; intensifies the following tempo word.

Morning serenade performed in the open air.

Triad built from two major thirds.

Composer's handwritten manuscript.

Subordinate voice to the main melody.

Symmetrical form with a mirror axis ABCBA.

Theorbo with additional bass strings.

Perceptibility of a sound.

Sudden change of key without modulation.

Turkish-style march.

Interval enlarged by a semitone.

"Tutti", all playing together.

Dotting a note.

First half of a musical period.

Non-chord neighbor note.

Player's accessories.

Comma above the staff indicating a breath or short pause.

Key with two flats in its key signature.

High valved trumpet of the 19th/20th century used to perform Bach's Baroque natural-trumpet parts.

Short, light piano piece.

Narrative vocal or instrumental piece.

Dance work with musical accompaniment.

Square-shaped concertina central to tango music.

Ukrainian plucked instrument with many strings.

Rapid string crossing on a repeated pitch.

Middle male voice between tenor and bass.

Gondolier's song in 6/8 or 12/8 time.

Musical era between 1600 and 1750.

Lowest human singing voice.

Low bass with a baritonal color.

Low-pitched member of the clarinet family in B♭.

Baroque thoroughbass with figured bass.

Continually repeated bass pattern.

F clef placed on the fourth line of the staff.

Lowest brass instrument in the orchestra.

"Beat"; ritmo a battuta = strictly on the beat.

Anguished, oppressed, melancholy.

French for the flat sign ♭.

Section of the Mass following the Sanctus.

Pitch bend, e.g. glissando or string bending.

Study of a composer's life.

"Whispered" tremolo on the harp.

Family of lip-vibrated wind instruments.

Chord whose tones sound simultaneously.

American 12-bar song form.

Standard harmonic scheme of the blues.

Stick with stretched horsehair used to bow strings.

Type and direction of bow technique.

Change of bow direction at note boundaries.

Late medieval double-reed instrument.

Sustained low drone, often on the tonic.

Fast French dance in 2/2 time.

Renaissance French round dance.

Medieval note value, equal to two whole notes.

Brilliant, technically sparkling.

With vigour and fire (con brio).

Comic vocal role in opera.

Bar connecting the flags of several notes.

Stylistic label for music outside the courtly sphere.

Low double-reed woodwind instrument.

Successive sounding of chord tones.

Played with the bow.

Key with two sharps, the relative minor of D major.

Wavering, alternating.

The stick of the bow.

Bow used to play strings.

To extend a voice beyond its normal range.

Brief breathing pause.

Individual time unit within a measure.

AB form without a reprise.

Rearrangement of chord tones into a different voicing.

Clef fixing the position of middle C.

Fast closing section of an operatic aria.

Soloistic interlude featuring virtuoso improvisation.

Two slanted strokes ("railroad tracks") indicating a brief general pause.

Diminishing in both volume and tempo.

Calming, growing calmer.

Bell-like figuration, often using harmonics.

In a singing manner, with a soft attack.

Song-like melodic line.

Pre-existing melody used as the basis of a composition.

Gregorian chant, monophonic plainsong.

Short, light canzona.

Clamp used to shorten the strings of a guitar.

Church-tower bell instrument played from a keyboard.

Multi-movement entertainment composition of the 18th century.

Comic canon of the English Renaissance.

Short, simple aria without repetition.

Cuban dance in 4/4 time.

Variation form built on a recurring bass pattern.

French art song or folk song.

High clef combination of the Renaissance.

Damping a cymbal immediately after striking it.

Gregorian composition in chant style.

Large-format manuscript containing polyphonic music.

Written in note-against-note chordal texture.

Designed dance to a composition.

Group singing by a choir.

Refrain of a song, or a complete chorus in jazz.

Melodic motion by semitones.

Figured, marked with thoroughbass numerals.

Semicircular ornamental figure.

Key with four sharps.

Medieval plucked instrument.

High Baroque trumpet register.

Medieval cadential formula or organum section.

Two-note descending neume.

Tone cluster of closely spaced pitches.

Short coda or small concluding passage.

The accompanist follows the soloist's tempo.

Virtuosic, rapid vocal embellishment.

Smallest audible interval difference.

4/4 metre, symbol C.

With soul, soulfully.

With fire, with verve.

With motion, slightly pressing forward.

Played with mute.

Solo group in a concerto grosso.

English term for the leader of the first violins.

Baroque concerto with solo and tutti groups.

Agitated style featuring tone repetitions, coined by Monteverdi.

Music conservatory.

Organ console containing manuals and pedalboard.

Baroque thoroughbass part.

Contrapuntal piece, e.g. in Bach's "Art of Fugue".

"Covered"; drum muffled with a cloth.

Renaissance capped double-reed instrument.

French term for a soft-toned brass instrument.

Italian for horn.

Fermata, hold sign placed above a note.

Tone color, sound shading.

English term for contrapuntal writing.

Ornamentation table after François Couperin.

Strophic section of a rondo or song.

Gradually growing louder, symbol <.

Singer in the smooth microphone style.

Antique cymbals with definite pitch.

Ratchet, loud percussion instrument.

Hungarian dance with slow and fast sections.

Closing section of the Gloria in the Mass.

Metallic percussion plate.

Wind supply driving the organ pipes.

Chord tones placed as close together as possible.

Voices moving in opposite directions.

Liturgical feast with processional music.

Fugue whose answer is the inverted subject.

Accompanying voice to the main melody.

Calm, composed.

Main choir in Venetian polychoral music.

Bright, light.

Art song with politically satirical text.

Chord progression that produces formal closure.

Discord, unpleasant simultaneous sound.

Artistic music handwriting.

Music for small ensembles.

Reference pitch, today a' = 440 Hz.

Multi-section composition for soloists, chorus and orchestra.

Director of church music.

Italian Renaissance strophic song.

Capo, clamp on the guitar.

Spanish wooden hand percussion.

Cleansing effect of tragedy.

Trill running through several adjacent tones.

Choir of children and adolescents.

Cantata composed for the worship service.

Mode of medieval and early modern music.

Modal scale from the medieval tradition.

Musical era between 1750 and 1820.

Cadential formula in vocal writing.

Rapid ornamental run in singing.

Microinterval, e.g. Pythagorean comma.

Artistic creation of a musical work.

Method of musical construction.

Melodic motion by steps.

Higher music school.

Pleasant simultaneous combination of tones.

Lowest clarinet.

Lowest tuba in the orchestra.

Low double-reed instrument an octave below the bassoon.

Medieval voice between tenor and discantus.

French round dance.

In concertante, virtuoso style.

Leader of the first violins.

Performance space for classical music.

Conical brass instrument with valves.

Renaissance capped double-reed instrument.

Playful character pieces.

Sign that fixes pitch reference on the staff.

Boys' choir.

Sign for the pitch reference on the staff.

Click sound in speech.

Sharp, incisive.

Abrupt ending of a section.

Composition fixed in writing.

Linking in voice-leading.

Small cymbal.

Renaissance wind instrument played with a lip-reed mouthpiece.

Downward stroke of the bow, symbol ⊓.

With inner concentration and humility.

"From the beginning"; repeat from the start, abbr. D.C.

"From the sign"; repeat from the marked spot, abbr. D.S.

Length of time a tone sounds.

Growing softer, symbol >.

Clearly defined, determined.

To be performed delicately.

"Half stop" – partial registration on the organ.

Downcast, depressed.

Bowing technique with separated but even strokes.

"The devil in music", historical name for the tritone.

System of the seven natural tones of a scale.

Sequence from the Requiem, "Day of Wrath".

Closing formula of a psalm tone.

Growing softer, synonymous with decrescendo.

Triad built from two minor thirds.

Medieval repeat sign.

Custos, guide sign at the end of a line.

1970s dance music in quadruple metre.

Melodic motion proceeding by leaps.

Modal scale built from equal intervals.

Sound distortion through overdrive.

Cheerful multi-movement light music.

"Divided"; a part is split among several players.

First syllable of solfège.

Twelve-tone technique after Schoenberg.

Very gentle, extremely sweet.

Sorrowful, plaintive.

Fifth scale degree and principal chord to the tonic.

Dominant with an added minor seventh.

Lowering by two semitones, symbol ♭♭.

Double pipe with two playing tubes.

Fugue with two independent subjects.

F and B♭ horn combined in one instrument.

Concerto for two solo instruments.

Two dots after a note extending its value to 1¾.

Note-value extension by three-quarters using two dots.

Church mode on D.

Famous ancient statue of a spear-bearer by Polykleitos (5th c. BC); by extension a model of classical proportion theory, occasionally invoked in musicological discussions of symmetry.

Electronic music style with shifted bass.

Vocal or instrumental piece for two voices.

Two notes performed in the time of three.

Middle section of sonata form where themes are worked out.

Sombre, muted.

Study of volume and its gradations.

Drum embellishment of two grace notes.

Lowest bowed string instrument.

Marked with a dot of augmentation.

Music with clear metric pulse for dancing.

Percussion instrument with a drumhead.

Playing drums.

A voice played by more than one performer.

Reduction of note values.

Perfect or minor interval reduced by a semitone.

Three superimposed minor thirds.

Noble, maestoso.

Aleatoric composition created by throwing dice.

Chord played note by note.

Note with the value of one-eighth of a whole note (quaver).

Scottish dance in 2/4 time.

Beginning of a voice; also a conductor's cue.

Lament or mourning piece.

French for ornament.

Lip placement at the mouthpiece.

With heartfelt expression.

Emphatic, insistent.

Energetic, forceful.

Identical-sounding pitches with different notation.

Opening dance or entrance music.

Ancient Greek victory ode.

Intermediate section in a fugue or rondo.

Funeral music for four like trombones.

Extension of a phrase structure.

Beginning of a work or movement.

Clearly enunciated, explicit.

Medieval instrumental dance.

Muted, "smothered" playing.

Low B♭ flugelhorn, tenor tuba.

Pleasant-sounding.

Passage drawn from a larger work.

First section of a sonata movement or fugue.

Extemporised, improvised.

Training of musical perception.

Encore performed after the concert.

Escape tone that does not return to the main note.

Family of conical brass instruments.

Dying away to nothing.

Bass clef placed on the fourth line.

Fourth syllable of solfège.

Latin word for face, often found in liturgical texts.

Easy, effortless.

Small bassoon in a higher tuning.

Diminished fifth used as a dissonance.

Renaissance chordal psalm-setting style.

Spanish dance in 3/8 or 3/4 time.

Free, improvisatory composition.

German term for fantasia.

Medieval three-voice texture with parallel sixths.

Hold sign placed above a note ⌒.

With fire, passionate.

Folk term for the violin.

Small military transverse flute.

Polyphonic vocal music with embellished voice-leading.

Ornamental accompanying figures.

To sustain a tone evenly.

Short rhythmic filler figure.

Last movement of a multi-movement work.

Principal closing tone of a mode.

Playing the guitar without a plectrum.

Indication of which finger plays a note.

Key with six sharps.

High male head voice, falsetto.

Ornamented stroke with a short grace note.

Flute-like, bowed over the fingerboard.

Plaintive, mournful.

Conical brass instrument in B♭.

Concert flute (English/French term).

Traditional music of a region.

Italian synonym for form.

Loud then immediately soft; symbol fp.

American ballroom dance in 4/4 time.

Baroque overture with slow introduction and fugue.

Italian for phrase.

Without strict tempo, rubato.

Vocal production with audible friction.

Italian Renaissance strophic song.

Italian for fugue.

Fugue-like section without strict fugal form.

Asymmetrical metre of 2+3 or 3+2 quarter notes.

Afro-American style with syncopated groove.

Symbol for harmonic function (T, S, D).

Harmonic analysis after Hugo Riemann.

Fast Bohemian dance.

Furious, stormy.

Length measurement of organ stops in feet.

Early 20th-century movement embracing noise music.

Authentic cadence ending on the tonic on a strong beat.

Position of the fingers on fingerboard or keys.

Symphony orchestra in full instrumentation.

Early form of the modern piano.

With strength, vigorously.

Character piece in Schumann's manner.

Interval of five semitones.

Interval of seven semitones.

Slow march for funerals.

Orally transmitted traditional song.

Full tone, without restraint.

Letter-based notation for keyboard and lute.

Piano with horizontal strings and action.

Treble clef placed on the second line.

Classical Japanese court music.

Graceful, courtly.

Lively Renaissance dance in 3/4 time.

Fast 2/4 dance of the 19th century.

Indonesian percussion ensemble.

French for scale.

Rest in all parts, symbol G.P.

Fast dance closing the suite, usually in 6/8.

Playful, jocular.

Joyful, cheerful.

Key with five sharps.

Exact, in strict tempo.

Glass harmonica, glass-music instrument.

Metal-bar percussion instrument with bright timbre.

Second main section of the Mass.

Suspended bronze disc with definite pitch.

Step by step, gradually.

Grand, lofty.

Heavy, very slow.

Traditional Alpine ornament symbol; also documented as an attack ornament in yodelling.

Ornamental figure composed of several notes.

Turn around the main note.

Medieval two-part singing in thirds or sixths.

Ornamental anticipatory note.

End point of a motion.

Keyboard instrument with plucked strings.

Overtone produced by lightly touching the string.

Collection of liturgical songs.

Played with the hand inside the bell for a brassy tone.

Cuban dance in 2/4 time.

Note worth two quarter notes (minim).

Rest equal in value to a half note.

Interval of a minor second.

String instrument with vertical strings and pedals.

Study of the simultaneous combination of tones.

System of chord progressions.

Mouth organ or accordion.

Minor scale with raised seventh degree.

Keyboard instrument with free reeds.

Music made in the domestic setting.

Guitar laid across the knees and played with a steel bar.

Low baritone oboe.

Dramatic, powerful tenor.

Heroic, powerful.

With heart, with courage.

Six-note tone series after Guido of Arezzo.

Medieval vocal technique with short rests dividing the melody.

Upper range of an instrument.

Soft-toned organ stop.

English dance, often in 3/2 time.

Characteristic progression of natural-horn writing.

French for octave.

Humorous character piece.

Festive song of praise.

Rhetorical figure of exaggeration; in music, affect heightened by extreme intervals or dynamics.

Plagal form of the Lydian mode.

Plagal form of the Mixolydian mode.

Valveless natural horn.

Horn tone with the bell half-stopped.

Overtone series used as a scale.

Acclamation in the Mass.

Historical organ wind-chest design using flexible hoses; rare, mainly in the 18th/19th century.

In the style of Hungarian folk music.

Holding back, ritenuto.

Cadence occurring within a formal section.

Inventio, polyphonic keyboard piece by Bach.

Leitmotif used for characterisation.

Self-sounding percussion instrument.

Recurring principal motive used by Berlioz.

Commanding, imperious.

Early 20th-century style focused on tone color.

Spontaneous tone-creation in performance.

Pressing, growing faster.

Pitch change in a psalm tone.

Restless, agitated.

Tool for producing musical sound.

Transcription of vocal music into tablature.

Interlude between acts or movements.

Artistic rendering of a work.

Pitch distance between two notes.

Accuracy of pitch; also the opening of a chant.

Opening chant of the Mass.

Two-voice keyboard piece by Bach.

Church mode on C, identical with major.

In the style of Irish folk music.

Iambic metre, short-long.

Inversion of a chord or interval.

Deceptive cadence V–VI.

Joyfully excited.

Afro-American musical tradition since around 1900.

Thrown, bouncing bow stroke.

Organ stop; "play".

Medieval minstrel.

Spanish folk dance in 3/8 time.

Melismatic closing cry of the Alleluia.

Connecting tone or melodic bridge between two chant phrases.

Cheerful, playful.

Director of a court chapel or opera house.

Mechanical pitch control on a wind instrument.

Historical brass instrument with keys.

Arrangement of keys on a keyboard instrument.

Folk bowed instrument.

Polish dance in 2/4 time.

First section of the Ordinary of the Mass.

Instrument played from a keyboard.

Defined scale with a fixed key signature.

Legato, played with a slur.

Additional line above or below the staff.

Liturgical cycle with associated musical feasts.

Sixth syllable of solfège.

Lamenting, mournful.

Lament featuring a descending bass line.

Austrian folk dance in 3/4 time.

Broadly, expansively.

Somewhat less broad than largo.

Very broad, slow.

Sacred language of the Western Church.

Plucked instrument with bent-back neck and frets.

Lute player.

Animated, fast, vigorous.

Light, weightless.

Ancient stringed instrument.

Beginning with the leading tone.

Semitone below the tonic, the leading note.

Gradually becoming slower.

Slow, calm.

Text book of an opera.

Strophic art song.

Joined group of notes in mensural notation.

Designation for the lower piano part.

Order of worship.

Mode on B with a diminished fifth.

Mode on B with a diminished fifth.

Cradle song.

"Long", especially a long-held fermata.

In the style of Lutheran church music.

Song-like, expressive character.

General layout of notation.

Synonym for a movement of a multi-part work.

Tonal mode with a major third above the tonic.

Sequence whole-whole-half-whole-whole-whole-half.

Medieval term for accidentally altered tones.

Scholarly study of music.

Flowing, pressing onward.

First theme in sonata form.

Most important theme of a movement.

Interval of three semitones.

Cheerful, jolly.

Polyphonic vocal piece of the Renaissance.

Tone painting that depicts the text in a madrigal.

Master, conductor.

Italian for major.

English term for major mode.

Cuban dance with syncopated rhythm.

Small plucked instrument with a rounded body.

Style between Renaissance and Baroque.

Strongly accented, each tone emphasized.

Italian for march.

Marching music in 4/4 or 2/4 time.

"Hammered" stroke with a sharp bow stop.

Moderately, moderato.

Largest mensural note value, two longas.

Third scale degree, mediant of the tonic.

Parent scale of South-Indian Carnatic music.

Several notes sung on a single syllable.

F horn used in marching bands.

Succession of tones that makes musical sense.

Study of melodic construction.

Minor with raised sixth and seventh ascending.

Ratio of note values in mensural notation.

Medieval and early-Renaissance system of notation.

Swell and decrease in volume on a sustained tone.

Principal liturgical work of the Catholic Church.

Study of metre and verse measure.

Tempo measuring device calibrated by Maelzel.

Moderately loud, symbol mf.

Middle female voice.

Third syllable of solfège.

Snare drum with tightened snares.

Repetitive musical style since the 1960s.

High medieval German courtly love poetry.

English term for minor mode.

Membrane sound-modifier, kazoo.

Italian for measure.

Moderate tempo.

Change of key within a piece.

Mode with a minor third above the tonic.

"Very"; intensifies the tempo or expression word.

Accompanied solo singing around 1600.

Single-voice music.

Quick alternation with the lower neighbor note.

In motion, fast.

Polyphonic vocal work on a liturgical text.

Continuously running mechanical rhythm.

Blowing device of a wind instrument.

French dance imitating the bagpipe.

Late-Renaissance style of refined text expression.

Music composed from recorded sounds.

Stand to hold sheet music.

Self-contained section of a multi-movement work.

Melancholy, doloroso.

Fugue in retrograde or inversion.

Metrically organised time unit.

Magnetic tape for sound recording.

Symbol ♮ cancelling a preceding accidental.

Fundamental frequency of a vibrating body.

Pitchless sound event.

Notturno for piano.

Valveless horn of the early Classical era.

Aeolian minor scale.

Post-1920 style reviving older forms.

Early notational sign placed above the Latin text.

"Nothing"; to fade away to silence.

Noble, dignified.

Interval of a second plus an octave.

Chord with an added ninth.

System for writing down musical tones.

Written symbol for a musical tone.

Flag attached to a note stem.

Vertical line attached to the note head.

Letter name of a tone.

Duration of a written note.

Opening choral movement, e.g. of a cantata.

Introductory movement or section.

Study of musical instruments.

First movement of a cyclic work.

Unfingered, freely vibrating string.

Essential, soloistic in character.

Series of integer-multiple partials.

Soprano double-reed woodwind instrument.

Low Baroque tenor oboe.

Interval of twelve semitones.

Clef with a small 8, transposed by an octave.

Work for eight players.

Stage work set continuously to music.

Italian comic opera.

Light musical stage genre.

Work, numbered as op.

Large instrumental ensemble.

Distribution of parts among instruments.

Medieval hurdy-gurdy.

Keyboard instrument with pipework.

Alternative reading offered in the score.

Introductory instrumental music.

Bach's secular cantata in a folk-like style.

Melodic note connecting two chord tones.

Caesura, melodic interruption.

Without lustre, neutral.

Keyboard instrument with hammer action.

Solo concerto for piano and orchestra.

Method book for learning piano.

Position of the left hand on the fingerboard.

With great feeling, appassionato.

Style featuring multiple choirs.

With several simultaneous voices.

Contemplative, introspective.

Closing piece, postludium.

Sustained bass tone beneath changing harmonies.

Sustained sonic texture in electronic music.

Free use of diatonic tones outside functional harmony.

Stage work without spoken text.

Voices moving in the same interval.

Sung in a speaking, lightly scanned manner.

Reuse of a work with new text.

Baroque variation cycle or suite.

Transition register of the singing voice.

With passion.

Pastoral piece, often in 6/8 time.

Foot keyboard of the organ or piano mechanism.

English term for sustained bass tone.

Five-note scale common in folk music.

Eight-bar phrase with antecedent and consequent.

"Ever-moving", a virtuoso piece in constant note values.

Heavy, weighty.

Improvisatory character piece.

Articulation of music into phrases.

Slur grouping a phrase together.

Half cadence with a falling fourth in the bass (iv6 → V in minor), named after the Phrygian mode.

Soft, symbol p.

Full name of the piano.

Smallest, octave-transposing flute.

French term for mordent.

Strings plucked with the finger.

Subdominant-to-tonic cadence.

Mode whose range extends below the finalis.

Small piece used to pluck strings.

Medieval ornamental notational sign.

Breath; also long melismas in chant.

"A little".

"Little by little", gradually.

Bohemian dance in 2/4 time.

Polish dance in 3/4 time.

Simultaneous use of different rhythms.

Pompous, festive.

Carried, between legato and staccato.

Closing piece.

Medley of popular melodies.

Introductory piece, often before a fugue.

As fast as possible.

Unison, prime.

Leading female singer in an opera.

"First" player in piano four-hands.

Characteristic succession of chords.

Mensural notation using numerical ratios.

Liturgical psalm singing.

Mensural dot of augmentation.

Serial music with isolated tone-points.

Forbidden parallel fifth motion in strict counterpoint.

Unison, fourth, fifth, octave.

Percussion instrument group.

Sorrowful, doloroso.

Driving motion.

Particular passage in the score.

Component of the harmonic spectrum.

Permitted parallel motion in thirds.

Larger sections of a work.

Individual sound of a definite pitch.

Electromagnetic pickup.

Highness or lowness of a tone.

Authentic cadence with the tonic in both soprano and bass.

Consonant preparation of a dissonance.

Introductory instrumental piece.

French dance in five sections.

Chord construction in fourths.

Work for four players.

Four notes in the time of three.

"Almost, as if", often used in comparisons.

Five notes in the time of four.

Calm, easy-going.

Refrain, recurring song section.

Combination of retrograde and inversion.

Remaining sound after a tone ends.

Major/minor pair sharing the same key signature.

Preparatory practice for a performance.

Modal scale system of North Indian music.

Gradually becoming slower.

Four-part vocal setting following strict counterpoint.

Writing out the figured bass in full.

Italian for recitative.

Traditional dance in a circle.

Reinforced, suddenly louder; symbol rf, rfz.

Devout, religious in character.

Reciting tone in plainchant.

Restatement of tones or sections.

Mass for the dead.

Resolution of a dissonance.

Crab motion, reversed order.

Doctrine of musical affect and expression.

Study of rhythmic motion.

Pre-classical imitative instrumental piece.

Repeated rhythmic figure.

Strict, exact.

Reinforced, suddenly louder.

Resolute, energetic.

Holding back, gradually slowing.

Rhythmically accented.

Recurring refrain in the concerto.

Musical era 1820–1900.

Lyrical character piece.

Form with a refrain and contrasting couplets.

Ornamented rapid run of notes.

Solo passage in French organ music.

With restraint.

Rinforzando, louder.

Double bar line with dots.

Moderately, somewhat.

Organ pipe with a reed.

Crescendo, growing louder.

Chord that substitutes for a harmonic function.

Counterpoint instruction in five species.

Inner attitude, character of the music.

Tones sounding together, forming a chord.

Smallest step of the diatonic scale.

Note head where the stem is attached.

Layering of sound masses, as used by Ligeti.

Snare with rattling strands.

Notated in the actual sounding pitch.

Sharp sign ♯ raising by a semitone.

Key signature containing sharps.

Change of left-hand position.

Curved line joining notes in legato.

Quiet, piano.

Long held, sustained tone.

Dominant of a scale degree other than the tonic.

Line system used to fix pitch.

Highest voice in a vocal texture.

Layout of all parts in one document.

Bowed near the bridge for a glassy sound.

First inversion of the seventh chord.

Dramatic style of the early Baroque.

Vibrating sound source of a stringed instrument.

Instrument producing tones with strings.

Light 19th-century entertainment music.

Bouncing, springing bow stroke.

Leaping motion.

Marian antiphon.

Ancient stringed instrument.

"Holy" acclamation of the Mass.

African lamellophone (thumb piano).

Metal double-reed instrument.

Italian for scale.

Improvised vocal singing with nonsense syllables.

Playful, joking.

Bronze bell aboard a ship, occasionally used as a sound source in orchestral music (e.g. Britten).

Ascending grace-note figure.

Very rapid upper mordent.

With a loud, piercing voice.

Stepwise motion between adjacent tones.

Tone that swells and then diminishes.

Recitative accompanied only by continuo.

Note with the value of a sixteenth (semiquaver).

Second-time ending of a repeat.

"Second" player in piano four-hands.

Interval of a second.

Idiophonic instrument.

Mensural value, "half brevis".

Study of musical signs.

Female lead role in historic opera.

"Always", maintained throughout.

Chord built of root, third, fifth and seventh.

Interval of a seventh.

Repetition of a pattern on a different pitch level.

Cheerful evening music.

Composition using serialised parameters.

Interval of a sixth.

Work for six players.

Six notes in the time of four.

Strongly accented.

Sailors' work song.

Jewish ram's horn.

Seventh syllable of solfège.

Ceremonial music of the Dogon (Mali), part of the Sigui festival held every sixty years.

Famous 18th-century organ builder.

"To the end".

Italian term for symphony.

Stylistically related to the symphony.

Programmatic music in a single movement.

Siren used as a sound source.

Short, sketch-like character piece.

Retuning of an instrument's strings.

English term for a gliding ornament.

Jazz glissando.

Snare drum.

Smooth, soft.

English solfège system.

Sung exercise using solfège syllables.

System of solfège syllables Do-Re-Mi.

Single-voice appearance.

Italian for sonata.

Multi-movement instrumental work.

Shorter, smaller sonata.

English term for Lied.

C clef placed on the first line.

Sustained, drawn out.

In a hushed voice.

English for sonic quality.

Spanish Renaissance dance.

Space between staff lines.

Bouncing, light bow stroke.

Spirited, lively.

Speech-song, introduced by Schoenberg.

Blaring, ringing.

Stable, calm.

Short, detached, with a rest between notes.

Synonym for note stem.

Composition in the style of another work.

Family of bowed string instruments.

String quartet plus an additional viola or cello.

Noisy, clattering.

Sliding, glissando-like.

Recurring section of a song.

Position of a note within the scale.

Stormy, hasty.

Fourth scale degree.

Theme of a fugue.

Sixth scale degree.

Sequence of stylised dances.

Sweet, dolce.

Displacement of accents against the prevailing metre.

Stepwise series of tones within an octave.

Dissonant held tone before its resolution.

Dominant of a scale degree other than the tonic.

Compound interval spanning nine diatonic degrees.

Ornament encircling the main note with both neighbors.

Chord built of root, third and fifth.

Tiring, growing calmer and softer.

Baroque figured-bass model.

Opening on a wind instrument used to alter pitch.

Special vocal production in folk traditions.

Acoustically perceptible auditory sensation.

Characteristic tone quality.

Working out the theme through its motives.

Ending figure of a trill or other ornament.

Tuned percussion instrument with kettle.

Rapid, even drum roll on the timpani.

Brass instrument with a slide mechanism.

Flute held sideways (concert flute).

Tuning strings or pipes.

Tuning reference fork.

Letter or number notation for keyboard or fretted instruments.

Defined beat structure of a measure.

Frame drum with jingles.

Sound-producing component of the clavichord.

"So much".

Southern Italian dance in 6/8 time.

"Touch", designation of the tactus beat.

Dance in the "German" style.

Speed of the music.

In strict, characteristic tempo.

Free, flexible tempo.

Mensural division of the brevis.

Italian for tenor.

Tenor saxhorn in B♭.

C clef placed on the fourth line.

Held to full value, symbol –.

Interval of a third.

Third plus an octave.

Four-note series spanning a fourth.

Large bass lute with long drone strings.

Continuo bass played on the theorbo.

English for held by a tie.

Tielert (also Tielken/Tilken), Renaissance round dance from the Flemish-Low German region.

Typical, characteristic.

Free virtuoso instrumental piece.

First scale degree of a key.

Latin for tone.

Closing stanza of a troubadour song.

Heroic female operatic role.

"Always, continuously".

Liturgical chant sung in place of the Alleluia.

Calm, tranquil.

Passing tone.

Shifting of a piece to another key.

Italian 14th century.

Rapid tone repetition.

Triangular metal percussion instrument.

Rapid alternation with the upper neighbor note.

Three notes in the time of two.

Metre with three beats per bar.

Six semitones, the augmented fourth.

Textual amplification of a chant.

Medieval poet-composer.

English for a turn ornament.

Ancient percussion instrument.

Thumb-under technique on the piano.

G clef placed on the second line.

Soft, delicato.

Sonic time-range in stratified-time music.

Worth two counting units.

High-pitched organ pipe length.

Composition following Schoenberg's serial principle.

Upward stroke of the bow, symbol V.

Unstressed beat before the strong downbeat (anacrusis).

Prime, the same tone in several voices.

Played at the same pitch.

Periodic motion of a sound source.

"Molto", intensifying word.

Individual line in a polyphonic texture.

Voices exchange their relative positions.

Medieval exchange of voices (Stimmtausch).

Full range of a voice.

Modification of a theme.

Setting of a biblical verse in a chorale or chorale verse.

Stanza or line of a song.

Alternating verse for two choirs.

Oscillating production of pitch.

"See", indicates an omission.

Spanish Renaissance plucked instrument.

Italian Renaissance strophic song.

Bowed instrument with sympathetic strings.

Bowed instrument with frets.

Solo concerto for violin.

Large bass instrument of the viol family.

Medieval French song form.

Lively, fast.

Very lively.

French for voice.

Music performed by singing voices.

Turn the page quickly; an instruction in the score.

Classical school of Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven.

Tone produced by exciting a column of air.

Woodwind ensemble of five different instruments.

Rest with the value of a whole note.

Scale built entirely of whole tones.

Step of two semitones.

Striding, moderate.

Woodwind instrument family.

Wavering, unsteady.

White key on the piano.

Dance in 3/4 time.

Character of soft, fluid sound.

Plaintive, sorrowful.

Propagation of vibration in acoustics.

Twelve-step tuning system.

Heavy, with weight.

Percussion instrument with wooden bars.

Extended xylophone with a wide range.

Alternating chest/head-voice singing style.

Preferred ornament symbol.

Andean panpipe pair.

With zeal, eagerly.

Like a gentle west wind.