In music, Dynamics refers to the character of your playing- a combination of tempo, volume, and style. This is especially important in playing the piano because you are often the only instrument playing. When you’re playing the piano, you should think of this as what makes the way you play piano music differently than somebody else would play the same notes. Here’s the ones you’ll need to Play Piano Now.

Sometimes the composer notes parts of the dynamics on the piano sheet music. A composer may technically write anything they want in the score to suggest how you should play the piece on you piano. Some markings, however, you’ll continue to see all the time. Typically, these are written in Italian, so you can always translate directions on the web.

Tempo- at the beginning of the piece you’ll see one of these suggestions, sometimes with a metronome setting added by the editor:

Adagio — rather slowly, erect (literally, “at ease”) (66–76 bpm)
Allegro — literally “joyful”, brisk (120–168 bpm)
Largo/Lento — slow (40–60 bpm), like lento
Moderato — moderate (108–120 bpm)
Presto — a very quick clip (168–200 bpm), (prestissimo- as fast as you can)
Vivace — fast and lively(≈140 bpm)

Volume

f – forte (loud)
ff – fortissimo (louder)
fff – fortississimo (really loud)
mf – mezzo forte (medium loud)
p – piano (soft)
mp, pp, ppp – like above

There are also several different types of markings which go along with single or multiple notes. The first is a slur, which means to play the notes in one phrase without lifting between:

The next are several different types of accents, which means to give a certain note more weight:

Finally, we’ll look at a cresendo and decresendo. This means to slowly change your volume over time.

There are many other types of dynamic markings, but knowing these should be good while you’re a beginner. To Play Piano Now, these are the ones you’ll need.