The term ‘rubato’ literally means ‘robbed’, or ‘stolen’. Usually associated with music from the Romantic period, we can think of rubato as a certain rhythmic flexibility that applies to some extent to music of all periods. There is a parallel with speech, where we naturally move through less important words and syllables, taking time over more meaningful ones. Unless we are playing a piece that depicts something mechanical, we avoid playing with robotic evenness and metronomic regularity.
When composers want to specify where rubato is to be applied, they might use speed-modifying terms such as rallentando, stringendo, meno mosso, etc. In the opening of the Prelude in G sharp minor Op 32 No 12, Rachmaninov
