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GLOSSARY
CHIEFLY OF MUSICAL TERMS
adaptation
This book defines an adaptation as a derivative text where significant
details of meaning have not been transferred which easily could have
been.
aria
This Italian word refers to the major solo numbers in operas and
oratorios. An aria is often preceded by a recitative, which is less melodic
and more conversational.
chanson
This French word for song denotes particularly the popular song tradition
represented by Piaf, Brassens, Ferré, Aznavour and others. By contrast,
French “art songs” are often called mélodies.
communicative translation
This means a reader-friendly TT which (in Newmark’s terminology)
focuses more on communicating with the audience than on close fidelity
to the ST.
downbeat
The strongest regular beat in a piece of music, which standard notation
places just after the barline. When there is a single note just before the
barline it is called the upbeat.
explicitation
Making explicit some information that was merely implied in the ST.
gist translation
A précis TT that transfers only the most important elements of the ST.
gloss translation
A wordy TT that includes notes and explanations.
harmony
The chords, all the notes sounded at one moment. Choice of harmony and
chord-progression often enhances a song’s emotional “colour”.
lexicon
Vocabulary, store of words.
Lied
This German word for song (plural Lieder) is sometimes used in the
narrower sense of “Art song in the 19th-century tradition of Schubert et
al”. Yet it can go far beyond German examples: the LiederNet archive
contains texts and translations of highbrow songs from dozens of
countries.
logocentric
Word-centred. This book applies the term “logocentric” to songs where
the words are more important than the music. Generally, however, songs
tend to be musicocentric.
melisma
Two or more notes all sung on one syllable. For example the first syllable
of “Silent Night” or the “-ot” syllable in “Swing Low Sweet Chari-ot”.
melody
The tune. The notes the singer sings, rising and falling in pitch.
metre
The basic time-structure of a piece of music. Waltzes, for example, are in
triple metre, whether they are slow or fast. The most common metre in
European music is quadruple: four beats to the bar, for which the timesignature is 4 over 4, meaning 4 quarter-notes in every measure.
metronome marking
A metronome is a device to give precise indication of tempo (=speed).
The marking ♩ =80 on piece of printed music tells us the unit counted (in
this case the quarter-note or crotchet ♩ ) and the number of those units per
minute.
musicocentric
This book applies the term “musicocentric” to songs where the music is
more important than the words.
naturalness
Naturalness, in a translation, means that a native speaker of the TL judges
that the text that could have been created spontaneously in that language.
neologism
Newly invented word or phrase.
partial rhyme (also called near-rhyme or “slant rhyme”)
Word-pairs like “time/mine” where the final sounds have some
resemblance, usually in the vowels, but not enough to make them true
rhymes (which require either same vowel and following consonant or
same consonant and following vowel).
phonic
Concerning the sounds of words and not their sense.
recitative
In operas and oratorios, especially in Italian, recitatives are wordy
sections which the singer declaims, with prescribed pitch but no clear
rhythm or melody.
refrain
The verbal phrases that are repeated more than once after every verse of a
strophic song. When a group of people join in, the refrain is literally “the
chorus”.
register
The variety of language chosen, especially its degree of formality.
SL & ST
Source language and source text.
semantic
This adjective means “concerning the meaning of words”. A “semantic
translation” (in Newmark’s terminology) focuses more on fidelity to the
ST than on making things easy for the audience.
sense
The meaning of the words, the content, what they are pointing to.
singability
The term is used here to mean relative ease of vocalisation. It focuses on
the physical action of singing.
skopos
This Greek word, meaning purpose or aim, is used in books about
translation to designate the “goal or purpose, defined by the commission
and if necessary adjusted by the translator” (Vermeer 2000: 230).
Thinking about skopos (plural skopoi) helps translators to clarify their
objectives and select appropriate strategies.
slur
The curved mark on a musical score indicating a melisma (two or more
notes on one syllable).
strophic
A song comprising several verses (“strophes”) all sung to the same tune.
surtitles
Captions projected above the stage, notably in opera, thus different from
film subtitles, which are projected low down on the screen.
syllabic setting
A text is “set syllabically” where every syllable corresponds to one note
of music (i.e. there are no melismas).
tempo
In music, this term means speed.
through-composed
A term calqued on the German durchkomponiert. In a through-composed
song every line of text has its own tune, unlike a strophic song where the
same music is repeated for several verses.
TL & TT
Target language and target text.
tie
A curved mark on a musical score joining two notes at the same pitch.
trochaic
This concerns the rhythm of a word like “crazy”. It is trochaic because its
two syllables have a strong-weak rhythm (stressed followed by
unstressed, and often also long then short).