impresario
Americannoun
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impresarios
plural
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a person who organizes or manages public entertainments, especially operas, ballets, or concerts.
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any manager, director, or the like.
noun
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a producer or sponsor of public entertainments, esp musical or theatrical ones
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the director or manager of an opera, ballet, or other performing company
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of impresario
1740–50; < Italian, equivalent to impres ( a ) impresa + -ario -ary
Explanation
An impresario is a promoter: someone who books, promotes, and organizes shows such as concerts. Impresario comes from an Italian word for a businessperson, and in English it especially refers to someone in the promotion business. In the music business, Bill Graham was a famous impresario who arranged concerts for huge bands such as The Rolling Stones and Pink Floyd. An impresario signs a band — or other entertainment — and makes a deal with the venue. Impresarios then arrange advertising and promotion to alert fans and arrange for tickets to be sold. Impresarios make shows happen.
Vocabulary lists containing impresario
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Trump stood behind the spread as host and Quarter Pounder impresario.
From Salon ● Aug. 12, 2026
Scenes flesh out a lineup of predatory city characters, from an obsessive building superintendent to a scheming nightclub impresario.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 19, 2026
Ms. Allen, a professor at Harvard, claims to have discovered a secret impresario of radical political thinking in the highest reaches of the British aristocracy.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 12, 2026
A Delaware Court of Chancery judge delivered a blow to wrestling impresario Vince McMahon and other World Wrestling Entertainment officials earlier this week.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 30, 2026
Lieutenant Scheisskopf unveiled his epochal surprise that Sunday with all the aplomb of an experienced impresario.
From "Catch-22" by Joseph Heller
But offshore internet betting, and the exception enjoyed by fantasy leagues, eroded the principles of sports impresarios.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 13, 2026
Later this year, the hot dog impresarios at Oscar Mayer will release their own vegan version in partnership with food technology startup NotCo.
From Salon ● Apr. 16, 2024
It doesn’t take long to sum up what happens in “Countdown,” the premiere of the new series from the “Game of Thrones” impresarios David Benioff and D.B.
From New York Times ● Mar. 21, 2024
Streisand was booked to play shows all around Greenwich, attracting celebrities, record labels and theatrical impresarios.
From BBC ● Nov. 5, 2023
He was none of your slow, sleepy, impresarios.
From The Devourers by Annie Vivanti Chartres
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
