Amoroso

As Printed on a Score

Most often attached to a tempo word in a heading — Andante amoroso — and sometimes printed alone in a part, beside the dynamic or combined with dolce or espressivo. It has no cancelling word; it gives way to the next tempo or character direction.

How Composers Use It

Amoroso asks for a loving, intimate warmth: a cantabile line, leaning gently on the expressive notes, tender rather than intense in colour. Mozart’s Andante amoroso in the B-flat Sonata K. 281 shows its Classical use as a heading for a graceful slow movement; Liszt drops espressivo amoroso into the middle of his Mephisto Waltz. Choose it over affettuoso when the feeling is specifically amorous, and over dolce when warmth matters more than softness.

Example

Mozart, Piano Sonata No. 3 in B-flat major, K. 281, second movement, m. 1: “Andante amoroso” — and the first four bars already move between p, f, cresc. and decresc.

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