Music Terminology: A Complete Guide to Key Musical Terms

Table of Contents

“Where Words Fail Music Speaks,”

goes the popular saying! But have you thought of the fact that there is a language in which musicians converse. They put their thoughts, soul and art using this language. Alright, long story short, music has hundreds of concepts and hundred more musical terminology for it.

I always think that, to truly understand or appreciate the beauty of music, one must learn to describe it using these musical terminology. Anyway, let’s wrap up this intro and head straight into learning a few essential musical terminology.

List of musical terminology

Acappella

It refers to music performed by mouth, without any musical instruments.

Accelerando

Accelerando denotes a gradual increase in tempo of a piece in music.

Acoustic

Acoustic refers to the sound produced without using any amplification electronically.

Adagio

Adagio is a musical terminology used to indicate slow tempo to convey calm and expressive mood. The tempo varies from 55-65 BPM.

Allegro

This Italian term refers to fast tempo. The tempo varies from 109-132 BPM.

Alto

Alto is a type of woman singing voices with the lowest vocal range.

Andante

Andante denotes a moderate tempo ‘at a walking pace’. The tempo varies from 73-77 BPM

Arco

Arco means ‘with a bow’. It is an indication to use the bow to produce sound on a string instrument.

Arpeggio

Arpeggio is a pattern in music that uses notes of a chord in succession.

Articulation

Articulation is a technique used to sing or play a note or a group of notes in regards to clarity, expressiveness and connection between the notes.

Ballad

Ballad is a song or poem with a story often about love, tragedy or any event.

Bar

Bar refers to the vertical lines or a measure defined by the count on a sheet music.

Baritone

Baritone is one of the male voice types with middle voice range.

Baroque

Baroque is one of the western music periods from 1600 and 1750. Bach, Handel and Vivaldi are some of the popular music composers of Baroque.

Barre

Barre refers to the technique used to press multiple strings on a single fret with one finger on any stringed instrument.

Bass

Bass is one of the male voice types who has the lowest vocal range.

Bel canto

Bel canto refers to the vocal technique used for learning opera style or Italian style of singing which emphasis on smooth, expressive vocals.

Belting

Using your chest voice above its breaking point to sing with the help of head voice is known as Belting in singing.

Breakdown

Breakdown in music is simplifying the arrangement of a section of a music highlighting the aspects of rhythm, pitches, etc

Bridge

Bridge is part of a song that sums up the entire theme of lyrics.

Cadence

Cadence refers to the order of chords that concludes or extends a phrase or a section of a musical piece.

Canon

Canon in music means the repetition of a melody at a fixed distance thereby creating an echo effect.

Capo

Capo is a device used to raise the pitches of the instrument. It’s used to shorten the length of the strings in a guitar

Chord

A chord is a set of three notes often played together or one after the other to form a harmonic unit.

Chorus

Chorus is the most repeated part of a song that features between the verses.

Circle of fifths

Circle of fifths is a concept in music consisting of key signatures, relative major and minor and the keys with their sharps and flats.

Clef

A clef is a music symbol that you can find at the beginning of the staff to indicate the pitches of the notes used.

Coda

Coda denotes a concluding part of a piece of music providing a resolution or an ending to the piece.

Consonance

Consonance refers to the phenomenon when more than one note creates a pleasing sound when played or sung together.

Chromatic scale

Chromatic is a type of musical scale that has all the twelve pitches in it.

Counterpoint

Counterpoint is basically a technique in music where two more separate melodies are joined to create harmony.

Crescendo

Crescendo refers to the gradual increase in volume of a musical piece when it is sung or played.

Da capo

Da capo in Italian means “from the beginning”. It is a direction meant for musicians to go back to the beginning of a piece.

Diaphragmatic breathing

Diaphragmatic breathing is a technique that involves improving lung capacity and vocal power by using the diaphragm.

Dissonance

Dissonance is the opposite of consonance which refers to a combination of notes that’s unstable.

Dolce

Dolce refers to playing softly or smoothly with an expressive tone.

Drone

It is a note that is sustained or repeated to provide a harmonic base.

Duet

Duet refers to any musical composition that requires two musicians to perform it.

Dynamics

Dynamics refers to the differences in the volume of performing a piece, whether it is played loud or soft.

Elegy

Typically, Elegy musical terminology refers to a sad or a sorrowful musical piece which is written in memory of someone.

Encore

When an extra performance is given because of the audience’s good response, it is called an Encore.

Ensemble

Ensemble refers to a group of musicians or a collective of performers, performing together in coordination.

Etude

A musical piece or a concert piece composed for the sake of practicing a technique is known as an Etude.

Falsetto

A singing technique used to sing pitches higher than a singer’s vocal range is called Falsetto.

Fermata

A symbol denoting longer sustaining of a rest than its usual duration according to the discretion of the performer is called Fermata.

Fill

It is a short, improvised passage in order to ‘fill’ gaps in between sections of a musical piece.

Flat

A note lowered by a half semitone interval from its natural pitch is called a Flat.

Forte

Forte is a type of dynamic meaning ‘loud’.

Groove

Groove refers to the rhythmic flow of a musical piece. Groove makes the music engaging for the audience.

Harmony

Harmony is a process of writing or playing or singing multiple notes or chords simultaneously to create a pleasant sound.

Hook

Hook refers to the most catchy line or phrase in a song that attracts the listeners and stays memorable.

Improvisation

It refers to spontaneous changes in creating melodies, rhythms to make a performance interesting, most commonly used in musical genres like Jazz, Blues, Rock, etc.

Interval

Intervals in music refers to the distance between any two notes on a sheet music.

Intro

It is the opening section of any piece of music that proceeds to the main theme.

Key

A key is the main note or a chord upon which the entire piece of music revolves around.

Key signature

Key Signature refers to the sharps and flats that appear next to the clef simply on sheet music indicating the key of the piece.

Largo

Largo is a type of tempo marking meaning ‘very slow.’ It has a tempo between 40-60 bpm

Legato

Legato is a technique where the notes are sung or played smoothly.

Lyrics

Lyrics are the words used to sing or play a melody of a song.

Major

It is a type of Scale or chord in music that sounds bright and uplifting. It has a formula of whole and half notes: W-W-H-W-W-W-H.

Melody

Melody could refer to the sequence of notes played or sung one after the other to create a tune or melody.

Metronome

Metronome is an instrumental device used to measure tempo in music.

Minor

Minor is a type of scale or chord with melancholic, sad sounds with a specific pattern of whole notes and half notes.

Minuet

Minuet refers to a slow musical piece in ¾ time in classical music. Minuet sounds elegant and graceful.

Modulation

When there is a change from one key to another in a piece of music, it’s called Modulation in music.

Motif

Musical ideas or patterns that are repeated throughout the piece.

Nocturne

Nocturne in Latin means ‘of the night.’ It is a musical composition that is typically lyrical and calm.

Octave

It is the distance between two notes that sounds the same with six notes in between them.

Opera

Opera refers to performing a story by acting and singing with orchestration. Check out our articles about Don Giovanni and The Magic Flute to know more.

Outro

Outro is simply the concluding part of a song.

Overture

Every opera performance begins with an instrumental piece that introduces the theme of the story and this is called an Overture.

Pentatonic

Pentatonic refers to a type of scale that has 5 notes in it. DO RE MI SOL LA DO, 4th and the 7th degrees removed.

Percussion

Percussions are the group of instruments like drums, cymbals or maracas that produce sound when tapped, struck or shaken.

Pitch

Pitch refers to the sound of a note whether it is low or high depending on its frequency.

Polyrhythm

Playing more than one rhythm pattern at the same time is called Polyrhythm.

Prelude

Prelude refers to a short introductory piece played at the beginning of a musical piece or song.

Quartet

When four musicians join together and sing or play musical pieces written in four parts, it is called Quartet.

Reprise

Reprise refers to returning to a section of music typically when that section has been played earlier in the performance.

Reverb

Reverb is an effect that adds echo to the sound as if it’s been heard from a huge room and it bounces back.

Rhythm

Rhythm refers to the pattern of silences and beats in music that creates a groove.

Riff

Riff is a short melody played on guitar forming the basis of the song.

Root

Root refers to the base note upon which a chord or a triad is built on.

Scale

Scales are the pattern of notes arranged in an ascending or descending order that usually forms the basis of melodies and harmonies in music.

Sharp

A note raised by a half semitone interval from its natural pitch is called a sharp.

Sheet music

In simple terms, sheet music is the written representation of music that we sing or play. It consists of musical notes and directions for musicians to play or sing.

Syncopation

An abnormal shift in rhythms with accenting weak beats is called Syncopation.

Solfège

Solfege is the system of Italian syllables, DO RE MI FA SOL LA TI DO that helps in identifying and learning musical notes.

Sonata

A musical piece with many sections is called Sonata. It is composed for one or two instruments to play.

Soprano

Soprano is one of the types of voices that has the highest voice range. Maria Callas was one of the greatest soprano singers of all time.

Staff

The set of five lines on which musical notes are written on sheet music is called Staff.

Symphony

Big complex musical piece with different sections and parts typically composed for orchestra is known as a Symphony.

Tablature

A form of musical notation with the directions for finger placement for instruments like guitar is called Tablature.

Tempo

Tempo is the speed in which we sing or play a musical piece.

Tenor

Tenor is the type of male singing voice with the highest male voice register.

Tenuto

Tenuto refers to sustaining a note slightly longer than its note value.

Timbre

Timbre refers to the quality of a sound.

Time signature

Time signature refers to the symbol that indicates the number of beats and the type of notes used in the piece.

Tone

Tone is the character of sound. Concepts like pitch, articulation and expressiveness contribute to the beauty of a tone.

Tremolo

The shaky or trembling sound created when a note is played back and forth very quickly is called Tremolo.

Tritone

Tritone means three tones in music.

Tune

Tune or a melody is a series of notes one after the other creating a pleasant sound.

Tuner

Tuner is a device or a tool used to tune the pitches in an instrument. Eg: a guitar tuner helps to adjust the pitches of the strings.

Vibrato

Vibrato is a vocal technique where the pitch of a note is oscillated to create a warm and rich sound.

Vivace

Vivace is a tempo marking meaning ‘lively or fast.’

Vocal exercises

Vocal exercises are a set of activities that helps inflexibility of vocal cords and breath control thereby improving singing.

Vocal fry

Vocal fry is the lowest register of a voice.

Waltz

Waltz is a musical piece with slow, smooth and flowing rhythms often set in ¾ time and in moderate tempo.

Closing thoughts

Understanding musical terminology helps in appreciating music thoroughly. Whether you’re a beginner or an advanced learner, musical terminology and concepts lets you bring music to life with expressions and creativity.

To learn and cherish the beauty of music, book a free demo with us, today!