adagio

American  

[uh-dah-joh, -zhee-oh, ah-dah-jaw] / əˈdɑ dʒoʊ, -ʒiˌoʊ, ɑˈdɑ dʒɔ /

adverb

1. Music. in a leisurely manner; slowly.

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adjective

1. Music. slow.

noun

• adagios
  plural

1. Music. an adagio movement or piece.

2. Dance.

   1. a sequence of well-controlled, graceful movements performed as a display of skill.

   2. a duet by a man and a woman or mixed trio emphasizing difficult technical feats.

   3. (especially in ballet) a love-duet sequence in a pas de deux.

adagio British  

/ əˈdɑːdʒɪˌəʊ, aˈdadʒo /

adjective

1. (to be performed) slowly

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noun

1. a movement or piece to be performed slowly

2. ballet a slow section of a pas de deux

adagio Cultural  

1. A very slow musical tempo.

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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• adagios
  plural

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Etymology

Origin of adagio

1740–50; < Italian, for ad agio at ease; agio < Old Provençal ais or Old French aise ( see ease)

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Explanation

In music, the term adagio means played slowly. If a symphony has an adagio movement, it's a section that's played at a slow tempo. Adagio can be an instruction on a piece of sheet music, directing the musician to play slowly, or it can be a description of a musical interlude. Sometimes a composition has the word adagio in its title, like Samuel Barber's "Adagio for Strings." The origin of adagio is the Italian phrase ad agio, in which ad means "at" or "to," and agio means "leisure."

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

adagio adagios

One ballerina selected from her stash a leotard whose gray velour later read as metallic silver under the studio lights during her grand adagio.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 11, 2026

It takes a few tries, but the adagio comes.

From New York Times ● May 24, 2023

A glowing second movement adagio felt paper-thin, translucent, lit from behind.

From Washington Post ● May 13, 2022

The adagio was performed at the Last Night in 2001, just four days after the atrocity, with American conductor Leonard Slatkin on the podium.

From BBC ● Sep. 11, 2021

Compare: Does the Music Therapy selection on the Mood/Relaxed channel on Spotify create the same physical reaction as any of the classical adagio selections suggested above?

From "Music and the Child" by Natalie Sarrazin

Hart, who provided the haunting adagios for that 2017 film and has been working with Lowery since 2005, was born to tackle the enchanted world of Sir Gawain.

From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 1, 2021

What’s mockable, in the end, is less the slow motion or the string-heavy adagios than the tendency to veer from eloquent to vainglorious and back again.

From The New Yorker ● Mar. 27, 2019

But the words she wrote are a symphony, an ode to the joy of wilderness, adagios and allegros and leitmotifs that sing out from the page.

From Scientific American ● May 2, 2013

And in the several adagios in Act II her idea of Romantic style leads her to concentrate on slowly unfolding various arm movements without actually bringing them to a conclusion.

From New York Times ● May 29, 2011

How could one ever be tired making adagios in color?

From The Maker of Opportunities by George Gibbs

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