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- Abbreviation
- andno.
- Tempo
- 80–108 BPM Click to play the tempo This range follows the modern convention that Andantino is slightly faster than Andante. By etymology the diminutive should mean slightly slower, and standard Italian dictionaries still define it that way — the disagreement is genuine and old, not a modern error.
What the sources say
| Source | BPM |
|---|---|
| Modern 'faster than andante' convention (Wikipedia 'Tempo' table) | 80–108 |
| Wikipedia, "Andantino" article (same 'faster' claim, narrower figure) | 78–83 |
How is andantino played?
Treat the word as a small inflection of Andante’s walking motion, not as a universal arrow. Treccani’s 1929 account and the older Grove dictionary read the diminutive as a little slower, while current Cambridge and Académie française entries read it as a little faster; Grove already observed that the music itself must decide. Rough modern bands such as 80–108 BPM cannot settle the contradiction. Use metre, phrase, harmony, chronology, neighbouring words and any composer-supplied metronome mark to choose a lightly more relaxed or more buoyant gait, always close to Andante.
How does andantino sound?
A lightly inflected walking motion — a hair more buoyant or a hair more relaxed than plain andante, but never far from it.
In context
The historical disagreement is the essential fact, not a mistake to smooth away. Grove points to three numbers in Mendelssohn’s Elijah headed Andante con moto, Andante and Andantino yet all marked at the same metronome rate, while Treccani, Cambridge and the Académie française preserve opposing conventions. This corrects the baseline’s false single chronology while retaining every topic: diminutive logic, semantic drift, context and the limits of BPM. Historical dictionaries independently attest andno. as a short form; the complete word remains safer when the tempo relation itself could be misunderstood.
Music theory and score context
See also
- Andantino (music) — Wikipedia (historical ambiguity)
- Tempo — Wikipedia (andantino BPM and the slower-vs-faster note)
- Glossary of music terminology — Wikipedia
- A Dictionary of Music and Musicians (1880) — Andantino
- Treccani — andante
- Cambridge Dictionary — andantino
- Dictionnaire de l’Académie française — andantino
- W. S. B. Mathews, Pronouncing Dictionary and Condensed Encyclopedia of Musical Terms (1895)