bugger bugger bagatelle

[asyncopated]

Can someone please tell me what a bagatelle is?  If you know, the etymology that would be great! Also is it associated with some musical structure?

Thanks.

al.
 

[bernhard]

The word “bagatelle” means something trifling or negligible. When applied to music, it means a light, short, whimsical piece. The emphasis is more on lyricism than on the development of ideas.

Hummel may have been the first to use the word to title a piece of music, and in his time, the concept of a short, technically undemanding piece, which concentrated on a single idea, was relatively new. Beethoven gave them respectability (he called them “Kleinigkeiten” – Little things).

Etymology: the word is of uncertain origin, but it exists primarily both in French and Italian (“Bagatella”) at least since the 17th century, meaning “a triffle”. In English, in the 19th century the word was also used to refer to a table ball-game.

Best wishes,
Bernhard.