syncopation

[ sing-kuh-pey-shuhn, sin- ]

noun

1. Music. a shifting of the normal accent, usually by stressing the normally unaccented beats.
2. something, as a rhythm or a passage of music, that is syncopated. syncopated.
3. Also called counterpoint, Prosody. the use of rhetorical stress at variance with the metrical stress of a line of verse, as the stress on and and of in Come praise Colonus' horses and come praise/The wine-dark of the wood's intricacies.
4. Grammar. syncope.

syncopation

/ ˌsɪŋkəˈpeɪʃən /

noun

1. music
   1. the displacement of the usual rhythmic accent away from a strong beat onto a weak beat
   2. a note, beat, rhythm, etc, produced by syncopation
2. See syncope
   another word for syncope

Other Words From

• nonsyn·co·pation noun

Word History and Origins

Origin of syncopation¹

1525–35; < Medieval Latin syncopātiōn- (stem of syncopātiō ), equivalent to Late Latin syncopāt ( us ) ( syncopate ) + -iōn- -ion

Example Sentences

Instead, the Meters strutted, turning down the volume and finding unlikely, hip-turning melodies in complex syncopations.

From Washington Post

You would need to go back to the 19th century to find rhythms in popular music with so little syncopation.

From The Daily Beast

The result is an effect of syncopation which is peculiarly forceful.

From Project Gutenberg

The purpose of the time step is to get the syncopation into the dancing step, and establish the "tempo" of the dance.

From Project Gutenberg

He moved slowly, painfully, one leg striking the pavement in syncopation, for it was sadly crippled by disease.

From Project Gutenberg

The rhythm may be said to be a sort of spite-rhythm, very decisive in most cases, but most of the time in syncopation.

From Project Gutenberg

Suggested by the poster commending a recent Revue as "the last word in syncopation."

From Project Gutenberg