tempo

Tempo means the speed at which a piece of music should be played. As with many other musical terms, Italian words are used to describe different tempos of music.

The word tempo means 'rate or speed'; in other words, it's how fast or slow something is happening. If you walk, you are moving at a slow tempo. If you run, you are moving at a faster tempo. Tempo is very important for music.

Tempo is still used in this way to describe music, but you'll also hear it used to refer to pace or speed in general, as in - "the increased tempo at the end of a close basketball game" or "the slow tempo of action in a novel." Definitions of tempo.

Since we traditionally use Italian for musical terms, we call musical time “tempo”, the Italian word for “time”. It might be slow, fast, or in-between, but tempo is one of the most important ingredients for making music.

Most of today's popular songs are written in a tempo range of 100 to 140 BPM. For example, "Beat It" by Michael Jackson clocks in at 138 BPM while "Dancing Queen" by ABBA is exactly 100 BPM. Many songwriters consider 120 BPM to be the perfect tempo for crafting a hit.

Andante – at a walking pace (73–77 BPM) Moderato – moderately (86–97 BPM) Allegretto – moderately fast (98–109 BPM) Allegro – fast, quickly and bright (109–132 BPM)

Tempo markings are usually written as a word that corresponds with a number, which you will see below, or in beats per minute (bpm). For example, Allegro means fast and is a tempo between 120 bpm and 168 bpm. The composer could write Allegro or 120bpm.

Tempo in music is important because, without understanding tempo, we would have no idea what speed to play a particular piece of music. For example, the intro to Bohemian Rhapsody is performed in a slow and dramatic style.

Tempo is a major element in music that determines the entire mood of it. We play music according to our mood and it depends on the tempo at which the music is set in. Tempo decides the mood of the song and helps the listeners in deciding whether it is a fun song or a serious one.

Andante – at a walking pace (73–77 BPM) Moderato – moderately (86–97 BPM) Allegretto – moderately fast (98–109 BPM) Allegro – fast, quickly and bright (109–132 BPM)

Crotch proposed the following list of tempo terms in ascending order of speed: grave, largo, larghetto, adagio, lento, andante, allegretto, allegro, vivace, alla breve, presto, prestissimo; but he admitted that there were those who regarded adagio, lento, andante, alla breve, and vivace 'rather as terms of expression ...

But. There's also something that is implied in this number that usually does not get printed on the sheet music the number by itself doesn't really help us quarter note equals 76.