Term for "shyly" ?

Depends entirely if you consider a score art as well. If it's prettier to have something in Esperanto, then hell, why not. You can always write translations later for the people who don't speak Esperanto (Berio's Sequenzas have tons of instructions both in english and german, and of course probably in italian in other editions.) It's not like you have to limit yourself to write in only one language or another, or any given combination. And, moreover, engravers and publishers are starting to be pretty passé, considering internets, computers and all that. You can print your own music in whichever way you like, and you can publish your own music, which I think is just as difficult as getting it published by a publisher these days.

Originally Posted by jujimufu

But for example, Birtwistle's scores are all in English, Lachenmann's are all in German, Messiaen's are all in French etc.

Just for the sake of it I had to check! I don't have any Birtwistle scores, but I had a quick look with Messiaen and Lachenmann. With Messiaen, the first thing I noticed in "Les oiseaux de Karuizawa" out of the "sept Haikai" was the mixing of Italian and French tempo-related terms, such as "rall. sempre - - - - - - - Presque lent". A bit earlier he uses "ralentir". For Lachenmann, I checked the Toccatina for violin solo, where he combines terms such as "distinto" and "fluido" with "Saiten hinter dem Steg", or "2 Oktaven höher".

And by looking through some other scores of other composers, I see -lots- of mixing up between languages. Berlioz can't make up his mind between Italian and French, dito Boulez and Lutoslawski, Bruckner can't decide between Italian and German, dito Schönberg, Mahler, and Stockhausen, and Ligeti switches between Italian terms and explanations which he gives both in English and German, and so on. EDIT: And just now I checked Brahms, Beethoven, Gluck, and Bartòk and found nice examples of mixed up languages too!

And yes, I'm certainly being picky But my point is that it's not that easy to decide what is a "technical standard" term and what isn't. Where draw the line? Sul pont.? frullato? marcato? espressivo? cantabile? And what's the line between tempo and "mood" indications? Is "Adagio" a technical term for a tempo, or rather a certain "character" of music, or even a possible reference to the form of a piece?

My point is only that it's hard to make a general statement that will provide the best result in all cases. And I certainly agree that consistency is important if you want your scores to be easily understood. Consistency doesn't have to mean restricting yourself to one language for -everything- though.

*should totally write a score in Klingon*

has the person who started this thread even said anything?

Timido would be the Italian word for "Timid" which has the same basic meaning as "shyly" while sounding quite a bit more pretentious.

haha sounds PERFECT! lol I did want pretentious Italian terms if possible :-)

Timid is exactly what I meant. I asked a harp player and they were like:
"Well 'shyly' is a word."
And I was like "Yeah, but you know what I mean!"
and she was "Like, In a shy manner?"
Me: "YES IN A SHY MANNER! What else would it mean?"
Her: "Ummm... No, I can't think of anything."
Me: "Omg, why couldn't you have just said that 5 minutes ago?!"

lol *sigh*

Anyway I did a search for Timid and found "Pauroso" which means "timidly, fearfully". Sounds perfect :-)

Happy I could help.

has the person who started this thread even said anything?

I have now... I only posted this a few days ago. I didn't expect so many replies so quickly lol

I figured there be like three posts with different terms haha...

Thanks everyone!
Chris :-)

Well, case closed. haha

have fun Chris

Thanks!

I'm enjoying writing this piece which is good. Only problem is I still have 30 minutes of OTHER music I need to write over the next half a dozen weeks. Sounds easy, right?
Well it isn't when you've got 6 other subject which all need study as well :'( lol

Anyway, I'll post a copy when I'm done and get some Opinions :-)

Go for one that's actually an accepted musical term, rather than botching through an online translator.

Affannoso