Siciliana

As Printed on a Score

Printed as a movement heading (Siciliana, Siciliano, Alla siciliana), often with a tempo word, over music in compound metre, usually 6/8 or 12/8. It covers the movement or section.

Also spelled: siciliano

How Composers Use It

A siciliana sways in a slow compound metre with dotted long–short rhythms, often in a minor key, pastoral or melancholy in cast — a favourite Baroque slow movement. Keep the tempo moderate and the dotting gentle rather than sharp. Alla siciliana borrows the character inside a larger form, as Amy Beach does in her Gaelic Symphony.

Example

Handel, Recorder Sonata in F major, HWV 369, third movement: “Siciliana”, between an Allegro and the closing Allegro.

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