Sognando

Sognando is Italian for ‘dreaming’. As a performance direction it instructs the performer to play with dreamy, reverie-like, atmospheric character. The music should feel as if it were taking place in a dream — soft, suspended, slightly out of focus.

The character is suspended and atmospheric. Sognando passages typically feature slow or moderate tempos, soft dynamics, sustained tone, and a sense of harmonic fluidity. Phrasing should breathe gently; rubato should add a sense of timeless suspension.

The direction is most common in late Romantic and Impressionist music. Debussy and Ravel use sognando-like character throughout; Schumann marks dreamy passages of his piano works (the Träumerei of Kinderszenen is the dreamy archetype). The mark calls for a particular quality of atmospheric, reverie-like playing.

Italian, gerund of sognare (‘to dream’), from Latin somnium (‘dream’).

Suspend the music. Slow phrasing, sustained tone, soft dynamics. Avoid any hint of urgency or grounded reality; the music should feel dreamlike.