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Beginning; used in directions that refer back to the opening, such as “comme au début” (as at the beginning) or “plus lent qu’au début” (slower than at the beginning), usually meaning its tempo or character.
Printed inside a direction that refers back to the opening: comme au début, plus lent qu’au début, Mouvt du début. It sets the tempo or character to match the opening and lasts until the next tempo word. A reader must look back to the first bars to know what it means.
Also spelled: debut, au début
A compact way to restore an earlier tempo or character without spelling it out, and to signal a reprise. It assumes the opening is memorable: if the start was itself a series of changing tempos, name the tempo (1er Mouvt) instead. Ravel uses it comparatively in Ondine — un peu plus lent qu’au début — to bring back an opening slightly transformed.
Ravel, Gaspard de la nuit, “Ondine”, piano, m. 73: “(Un peu plus lent qu’au début)”, printed together with au Mouvt in the same bar.
Début is one of 1755 terms in the Gradus musical dictionary: the words, abbreviations and instrument names that appear in printed scores, plus the vocabulary composers use to talk about them.
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