ballade
Americannoun
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ballades
plural
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a poem consisting commonly of three stanzas having an identical rhyme scheme, followed by an envoy, and having the same last line for each of the stanzas and the envoy.
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Music. a composition in free style and romantic mood, often for solo piano or for orchestra.
noun
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prosody a verse form consisting of three stanzas and an envoy, all ending with the same line. The first three stanzas commonly have eight or ten lines each and the same rhyme scheme
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music an instrumental composition, esp for piano, based on or intended to evoke a narrative
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of ballade
1485–95; < Middle French, variant of balade ballad
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:
He hoists the guitar and launches into a beautiful ballade.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 12, 2026
He does this while improvising an elaborately complex poem called a ballade.
From Salon ● Feb. 28, 2022
They began with three works by the 14th-century composer Guillaume de Machaut: a rondeau, a ballade and a motet, arranged by Ari Streisfeld, one of the JACK’s violinists.
From New York Times ● Mar. 4, 2010
Mr Austin Dobson, who had already made successful use of the triolet, was at the head of this movement, and in May 1876 he published in The Prodigals the first original ballade written in English.
From Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 8, Slice 5 "Dinard" to "Dodsworth" by Various
Deschamps has left no less than 1175 ballades, and as the ballade usually contains twenty-four lines at least, and frequently thirty-four, this of itself gives a formidable total.
From A Short History of French Literature by George Saintsbury
But Louis Lortie offers a worthy addition with his elegant interpretations of the four ballades, the Opus 57 Berceuse, the Opus 60 Barcarolle and six nocturnes.
From New York Times ● Dec. 20, 2012
A 2004 recital disc by Piotr Anderszewski might not suit every taste, given the broad tempos and elastic phrasing this Polish-Hungarian pianist adopts in seven mazurkas, two ballades and two polonaises.
From New York Times ● May 27, 2010
Chopin composed only four ballades, but they contain some of his most passionate and enticing music.
From Time Magazine Archive
To the latter writer—except in the ballades, which are quite his own, and can be paralleled from no other language known to me—he bears a particular resemblance.
From The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 3 (of 25) by Robert Louis Stevenson
Eighty thousand lines, twelve hundred ballades, nearly two hundred rondeaux, a vast unfinished satire on woman, the Miroir de Mariage, fatigued even his own age, and the official court poet of France outlived his fame.
From A History of French Literature Short Histories of the Literatures of the World: II. by Edmund Gosse
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