Gazing at the lists of performance directions for grade 5 theory, I have come to the conclusion that I don't like the German or French words. Why have langsam when adagio is the equivalent speed, or why lebhaft when there is vivace ? Maybe I am just an old fuddyduddy, does anyone else feel the same?
Looking back over past papers Etwas lebhaft was asked in 2008 and 2009 and langsam in 2006, only Italian words last year - so maybe this year they might be in the mix again

Think about those German and French composers who were asking the same questions and did something about it.....

Some words are not truly translatable, and then a composer might well prefer to use ones from their own language, with all the associated nuances they know.
I love having wide ranges of words to describe mood etc - I just wish I knew all the underlying meanings behind those from all those languages of which I know little or nothing.

Ooh no. You couldn't have Mahler without "Sehr feierlich, aber schlicht".

I definitely prefer the German words. When I wrote my composition for the theory paper I used German, because I have a better understanding of what it means.

Immer schneller, und mit Feuer (from Schumann Fantasiestucke for clarinet) is pretty good too!

I like the mix of languages in performance direction.

Interestingly Beethoven used Italian for most of his compositions, then for a very short time switched to German , then reverted back again. I wonder why this was .
The Piano Sonatas Op 90 and Op101 are in German eg

'Etwas lebhaft und mit den innigsten empfindung' starts the Op101.

Flautando translates Lebhaft is Vivace, but this movement cannot be described as Vivace, I think Lebhaft is more 'moving along'. Ie 'Always moving along and with the deepest feeling'

This is getting really interesting, I'm not admitting defeat though I'd like to know the nuances behind German and French words too, but in the translations given for the theory exams they just have their basic equivalent meaning, ie lebhaft meaning lively - as does vivace.

lebhaft is full of life yes, and vivace could be described similarly. But.....try imagine a German expressing full of lifeness, and then an Italian? I contend they'd be entirely different animals

Full of life as in "not dead" ?

Grrrrr - and imagine that with a Germanic rolled R, if you please. I'm half and half, and have my loyalties...

Of course we could include French as well. Ravel and Debussy often gave the simple instruction 'Vif'

But we mustnt get carried away by those weird Satie ones eg 'Ouvrez la Tete'

Ah well early bedtime tonight, was up before 6 this morning

et pourquois pas ouvrir les tetes...?
I like those too

What about English musical direction, particuarly as used by Percy Grainger.
Taken from his "Irish Tune from County Derry"for concert band

e.g. Tempo :Flowingly

musical direction as found through the piece...

gently but feelingly,slacken,louden gradually,slow off lots.etc etc

This extract from Wikipedia gives the following explanation....

"......This led to attempts, in his letters and musical manuscripts, to use only what he called "blue-eyed English" (akin to Anglish and the "Pure English" of Dorset poet William Barnes) which expunged all foreign (i.e. non-Germanic) influences. Thus many Grainger scores use words such as "louden," "soften," and "holding back" in place of standard Italian musical terms such as "crescendo," "diminuendo," and "meno mosso."

(I believe Benjamin Britten used English as well)

When you're used to Italian terms, the English looks odd.

Elgar of course invented his own Italian words "Nobilmente" for example

I make my own words up too - I often have a ritlet at the end of a song, with maybe a pausette on the last note.

Grave means dead slow

I've always fancied writing moderato ma non troppo, or perhaps prestissimo ma non troppo

One of Copland's American songs has the direction "hold back a trifle" Make of that what you will

Sounds like catering for unexpected guests

I can't remember which song it was, but I did actually see "moderato ma non troppo" the other day. Student and I had a good giggle over it.



A student took this bar a bit quickly once so I told her she had let go of the trifle too soon!

I still like Prokofievs 'Ridiculosamente' (Visions Fugitifs) . Whats that in German and French ?

I prefer the Italian terms, if only because I'm far more familiar with them than others. A reasonable working knowledge of French gets me through their terms, while I still have to look up many German terms. But these terms do add a certain colour to some works.

Are there works around that use terms that aren't Italian, French, German or English?

What did Tchaikovsky use and what about Nielsen, Larsson, Eggert?
I was pondering this all night, why do the Italian words/terms appeal to me more and I agree with barry-clari, it's because I'm more familiar with them. I love linda.ff's 'hold back a trifle' from Copland

There is a good reason for standardising on one language, and it might as well be Italian, as it is established historically, and widely understood.

It may seem reasonable to use French and German too, especially as native speakers can express more. It is easy enough for use Europeans to master a bit of French and German, but what about, for example, Japanese students? And with 6,000+ languages in the world, and about 100 of those have more than 10 million native speakers, what would happen if every musician wanted to write instructions in their native tongue 0... how would you feel about getting a piece with directions in Yoruba, Kurdish, Amaraic, or Zulu!!

I was pleased they mix up the languages, at least I now know why I struggled through A level french and german all those years ago. Its about the only time they have come in useful since!!

Ooh yes that's a lovely one. I'm looking foward to being able to nail "vif".


He used a nice mixture of English and Italian. Not exactly standard though. How about "Con Slancio"?

There is also a wonderful one used by Paul Hindemith in his Viola Sonata Op 25 No. 1:
The tempo is given as crotchet = 600-640 with the instruction "Rasendes Zeitmass. Wild. Tonshonheit ist Nebensache." (Raging tempo. Wild. Tonal beauty is of secondary importance").

I think standardising to one would be too boring, and limiting. Words are beautiful things, expressing so much of the cultures they come from, so why not learn some Zulu, Finnish, Icelandic, or whatever, if those are the languages composers think in? And nowadays, finding out basic meanings has become a doddle, with the telescoping world and of course t'internet. Should we then meet a native speaker of a language we've been puzzling over, why, it gives us a conversation starting point .

German vocab appeared in the June exam (grade 5) this year. Some students were quite surprised/unprepared as they simply hadn't been expecting German terms.
Best wishes and good luck.

你有一個好點的有 یہ چیزیں زیادہ دور دلچسپ بنا دے گی Што мислат другите

Why ever not? They are there in the Grade 5 theory books, and that is generally taken to mean that they could be set in the paper!

even though my machine doesn't have a chinese character set, the translators were most helpful

Chinese, Urdu, Serbian, for anyone else who wants a go .

We use Italian mostly for music for the same reason they use French for ballet steps - musically speaking it's an international language. You don't have to "learn Italian" to understand these expressions, you just have to learn those expressions as though they were yeat another language, the "music" language. It's the fact that anyone in any country can understand it that is the reason for keeping it.

Though, speaking of ballet and French - what do they do in football now that they have all these international players? Do they all have interpreters running around the field while they're training?

They unify it all with ballet terminology

Pas de Chat = no cats allowed

jeter - sorry but the forum site makes nonsense of the characters I have for accents - = chuck instrument off the pier, it doesn't work....

Wouldn't whatever the language of synchronised diving be more appropriate?

I agree, I made sure I covered as much vocab as possible in my own revision!

This reminded me of a kitkat ad that was on several years ago where the manager was trying to explain his new tactics and every player seemed to have their own individual interpreter translating every single thing the manager said!

Thanks for the heads up and for good luck wishes niobe