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Gabrieli, Andrea -
The 'other' Gabrieli, Giovanni's uncle. Actually Andrea had career enough to not be considered 'other', but he seems to be stuck with the nickname.
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Gamelan -
An ensemble of pitched percussion native to the Indonesian island of Bali.
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Gap-scale -
Any scale which leaves out tones from what we consider to be a full scale. The most common example is a pentatonic scale which uses only the black keys of a piano, thus leaving out the lower tones of both the half-steps which appear in a full scale. This of course leaves gaps.
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Garden State Pavilion -
'S no horses will be auctioned off during intermission.' The Garden State Pavilion is the horse auction facility at the Garden State Park Race Track in Cherry Hill. It is the only concert venue in New Jersey with an ashtray in the armrest of each seat.
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Gavotte -
A 17th and 18th century dance from France which is in four beats beginning on beat three and ending on two. 3-4-1-2, etc.
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Germinal writing -
From a small motive (a germ) larger ideas develop, using various permutations of the original.
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Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde -
Association of Friends of Music. Perhaps the most influential musical club in Vienna. ________________________
'Ghost Trio' -
So named by the publisher, not by Beethoven.
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Gig -
Originally jazz slang for a playing job. It is now generally used by musicians of all kinds to mean the same thing. Indeed, by now it is a term used for "job" by many people in many fields, though we suspect not among investment bankers.
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Gigue -
Jig. A rollicking dance in 6/8. A common final movement in a baroque suite. Though no longer called a gigue, the same feel is used in many a symphony and concerto finale in the classical period.
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Gilbert & Sullivan style -
So predictable are the basic characters in G&S that the incomparable music-comedienne Anna Russell provided a 'Write your own Gilbert and Sullivan' template, as it were. It takes real skill to satirize satire, and her recording of her own New York upper-crust version of G&S is classic. My son, who knows Mikado cold and attended with me, was humming a supposedly Mikado tune between dinner courses (at a Japanese restaurant, of course), when he suddenly noticed that he was singing Russell not Sullivan.
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Gimel or gymel -
Parallel thirds, like close harmony sung at camp. It was a medieval practice which continues into the present.
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Giocoso -
Jocular, amusing. Don Giovanni is a "dramma giocoso" as distinct from an "opera buffo," a comic opera.
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Glass harmonica -
An instrument invented by Benjamin Franklin which recreates mechanically the effect of rubbing one's fingers on the rims of tuned crystal glasses. Mozart is the best-known composer for it, having written a late chamber work for flute, glass harmonica, and strings.
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Glissando (pl. -i) -
A slide from one pitch to another.
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Glockenspiels -
Fairly small *metallophones without *resonators
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Glottal stops -
The air flow is interrupted by closing the throat with the glottis. In singing this is one means of articulation.
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Goldberg Variations -
According to the conventional story, which is no longer completely accepted, the Bach piece was commissioned by the Russian envoy to the court of Dresden, Count Hermann von Kayserling, who asked Bach for something "of a quiet, and at the same time, cheerful character," that would brighten him up a little on his sleepless nights. It is named after Johann Theophilus Goldberg, Kayserling's keyboard player. The work is written for a *two-manual instrument. To attempt it on the piano with its single manual requires careful planning of the placement of fingers, hands, and arms, so that all the notes can be reached without collisions. Nazarian says, "Playing on a single manual when the music was written for two manuals is like a one-way street where the cars are going two ways." The piece is intellectually demanding for both performer and audience, with its grouping of the 30 variations into ten groups, most of which consist of a free variation, a virtuosic variation, and a contrapuntal variation.
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Grace note -
A little note of no fixed duration, but quite short. Its placement with regard to the beat varies according to the style of the period.
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Grand pause -
A place in a score where all the parts have silence of prolonged duration. Usually it is shown by a full measure of *rest and the letters "G. P."
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Grand staff -
The set of two five-line staves upon which keyboard music is usually written.
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Grande ligne -
The large line, the connecting overall scope of a piece.
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Grazioso -
Charming, graceful, gracious.
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Gregorian chant -
Unaccompanied, single-line melody setting liturgical medieval Latin-texts in the codification sanctioned by Pope Gregory the Great ca. 800 a.d.
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Griffes, Charles Tomlinson -
American composer of *impressionist music for piano, some of which he later orchestrated. His last work, the piano sonata, marks a dramatic stylistic departure, moving into a world of tightly controlled motives.

Griffes' mother lived in Bloomfield, so when he died he was buried in that New Jersey town.
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"Großmächtigen Prinzessin" -
From Richard Strauss's Ariadne auf Naxos is one of the most difficult soprano arias in the standard repertoire.
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Ground -
A repeated bass line upon which a song or changing melody and harmony are placed. It was an English practice of the renaissance and early baroque.
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Groves (Groves Dictionary of Music and Musicians) -
One of the primary reference encyclopedias about music.