bouzouki
Americannoun
noun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of bouzouki
1950–55; < Modern Greek mpouzoúki; Turkish bozuk (broken, ruined, depraved; cf. bashi-bazouk) or büzük (constricted, puckered) adduced as sources, but sense development is obscure
Explanation
A bouzouki is a stringed instrument that's similar to a lute or a mandolin. In Greece, the bouzouki has traditionally been used to play folk tunes at parties or gatherings. It is widely attested that the word comes from the Turkish bozuk, meaning "broken" or "modified." This refers to the way the instrument's Turkish predecessor was tuned, with "breaks" between adjacent strings, which were set at different pitches. The bouzouki has a pear-shaped wooden body and a long neck, and it sounds like a lower-pitched mandolin. Traditionally an instrument that accompanied folk dancing, the bouzouki is now played in all kinds of genres around the world. In Greece, it also remains a symbol of pride and modern identity.
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:
Irish pipes, bouzouki, violin and fiddle also feature in the performance alongside an oud - a stringed instrument often described as similar to the European lute - and Middle Eastern percussion.
From BBC ● Jan. 26, 2026
To admirers who flocked to readings where the white-maned poet also played a bouzouki, he was a bard of irresistible charisma.
From Washington Post ● Nov. 23, 2021
Bly, a shambling white-haired guru who strummed a bouzouki and wore colorful vests, was easily mocked as Iron John himself, a hairy wild man who, in the German myth, helped aimless princes in their quests.
From Seattle Times ● Nov. 22, 2021
The next thing I knew we were dancing full tilt to the bouzouki music, just the two of us, while the crowd made a ring around us, clapping in rhythm and egging us on.
From The New Yorker ● Jun. 18, 2018
“Where did I put that bouzouki of mine, anyway?”
From "Middlesex: A Novel" by Jeffrey Eugenides
If someone were looking for a symbol of the excesses that lead to the country's financial crisis, they need look no further than the culture of bouzoukia, a uniquely Greek celebration of the good life.
From Time ● May 24, 2010
What did was multiple mikes and speakers, and the installation of internal mikes in such instruments as guitars and bouzoukia.
From Time Magazine Archive
Despite famously composing much of Hounds of Love on a synthesizer - the Fairlight CMI - she melded those electronic sounds with acoustic folk instruments, such as balalaikas, bouzoukis and didgeridoos.
From BBC ● Jun. 17, 2022
Arshag still has his dad’s old instruments — the ouds, bouzoukis, banjos, synths and mandolins.
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 23, 2021
In a 240,000-square-foot factory an hour east of New York City, several hundred workers buzz from shift to shift making strings for guitars, violins, Greek bouzoukis and Turkish ouds, some 700,000 per day.
From Forbes ● Aug. 20, 2014
Working with a new translation by Aaron Poochigian, the company is portraying Jason’s adventures in free performances across the city, using masks, wild costumes, drummers and the Greek guitars known as bouzoukis.
From New York Times ● Sep. 20, 2012
First came the semiofficial merrymaking, amid champagne toasts, flowers and bouzoukis, on the afterdeck of the Onassis yacht Christina.
From Time Magazine Archive
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.
