Rhapsody is a musical genre.

"Rhapsody" usually refers to a short piece composed of ballad phrases and free form. The term Rhapsody comes from the ancient Greek epic chanter. It originally meant an epic poem recited in a majestic tone.

Since the 19th century, rhapsody, as a musical genre, refers to an emotional fantasy. Often based on the tones of ethnic, folk or popular music. Later, in professional creation, it refers to the instrumental fantasy developed with folk songs as the theme. Most "Rhapsody" are variations based on slow folk tunes, and compared with recitative passages and fast folk dance passages, the music is rich in folk characteristics.

After the 19th century, rhapsody used national and folk music materials to form an instrumental solo or orchestral piece with a freer structure, epic style and national color. Most of them have distinctive national colors and narrative passages. Such as Liszt's "Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2", Enescu's "Romanian Rhapsody No. 1", Ravel's orchestral "Spanish Rhapsody", Dvo?ák's orchestral "Slavonic Rhapsody", Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue" etc. Raff, Lalo, Debussy, and Bartok also composed similar music.