Lustig

As Printed on a Score

Printed above a part or as a heading; in orchestral scores usually lower-case over a single instrument’s phrase. It colours that phrase or section and ends when a new character word is printed.

How Composers Use It

Merry, jolly, with a hint of fun — closer to scherzando or giocoso than to the warmer freudig. Mahler gives it to two trumpets in the Rondo-Finale of his Fifth Symphony to set a passing, almost comic tone inside a larger texture. Use it where the performer’s attitude should change but the tempo stays put; it pairs naturally with light, pointed articulation.

Example

Mahler, Symphony No. 5, fifth movement (Rondo-Finale), first trumpet, m. 518: “lustig” at f.

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