crescendo
Americannoun
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Music.
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a gradual, steady increase in loudness or force.
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a musical passage characterized by such an increase.
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the performance of a crescendo passage.
The crescendo by the violins is too abrupt.
- Antonyms:
- diminuendo
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a steady increase in force or intensity.
The rain fell in a crescendo on the rooftops.
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the climactic point or moment in such an increase; peak.
The authorities finally took action when public outrage reached a crescendo.
adjective
verb (used without object)
noun
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music
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cresc. a gradual increase in loudness or the musical direction or symbol indicating this
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( as modifier )
a crescendo passage
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a gradual increase in loudness or intensity
the rising crescendo of a song
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a peak of noise or intensity
the cheers reached a crescendo
verb
adverb
Discover More
The term is sometimes used figuratively to indicate rising intensity in general: “As the days went on, there was a crescendo of angry letters about my speech.” Crescendo is also sometimes misused to indicate a peak of intensity, as in, “The angry letters about my speech hit a crescendo on Wednesday.”
Other Word Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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crescendosimple
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crescendoessimple
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have crescendoedperfect
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has crescendoedperfect
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am crescendoingprogressive
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are crescendoingprogressive
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is crescendoingprogressive
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have been crescendoingperfect progressive
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has been crescendoingperfect progressive
Past
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crescendoedsimple
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had crescendoedperfect
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was crescendoingprogressive
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were crescendoingprogressive
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had been crescendoingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of crescendo
1770–80; < Italian: literally, growing < Latin crēscendum, gerund of crēscere to grow; see crescent
Explanation
In a crescendo, the music is getting louder. There's often a crescendo in a large group of talking people, too. This word comes from classical music, where it's very important how loudly the instruments play. If a tuba is crescendoing at the wrong time, then a quiet piano part might not be heard at all. The crescendo is important in all kinds of music, because volume — how loud something is — is one of the main features of music. If you are whispering and gradually raise your voice and then end up shouting, that's a crescendo as well.
Vocabulary lists containing crescendo
"Bonne Annee," Vocabulary from the personal essay
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National Spelling Bee '14: Prelims Round 2
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"The First Day of School," Vocabulary from the short story
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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:
Lindzon, also a partner at venture-capital investor Social Leverage, noted at the time a crescendo in the chatter about AI chips, he told MarketWatch in an interview on Monday.
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 21, 2026
Linda Noskova wins the women’s championship, and provides the emotional crescendo of the tournament.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 13, 2026
But that's all turned on its head as we reach the awkward, clumsy crescendo of the day: the talent show.
From BBC ● Jul. 10, 2026
The troubles reached a crescendo during the live finale when a distraught Tran revealed that the man she had chosen as her husband-to-be, Devin Strader, had ended their engagement a month before the broadcast.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 24, 2026
They feel like a crescendo, but they don’t necessarily seem to add up to one in terms of meaning.
From "Words Like Loaded Pistols" by Sam Leith
“No other tenor did that. And just multiply that a thousand times. It’s crescendi, the decrescendi, all the lovely musical things. He’s just sharp that way, probably the best.”
From Washington Times ● Nov. 24, 2018
As to the poets who made it into Dear World, there are predictable highs, plateaux and crescendi.
From The Guardian ● Apr. 12, 2013
Thus, in the coloratura passages of Mozart's arias, I have always sought to gain expressiveness by crescendi, choice of significant points for breathing, and breaking off of phrases.
From How to Sing [Meine Gesangskunst] by Aldrich, Richard
The suggestion of orchestral relationships is contained in the massiveness of the harmonic texture, and in the cumulative effect of the climaxes and crescendi.
From Edward MacDowell by Gilman, Lawrence
This did not prevent Rossini from continuing to write crescendi, nor from being satirised and caricatured as "Signor Crescendo," when, some ten years afterwards, he went to Paris.
From The Great Musicians: Rossini and His School by Edwards, Henry Sutherland
The song blends delicate piano with impressive vocal crescendos, which Goodrem -- a songwriter, musician, film star and a coach on The Voice Australia -- has brought to perfection.
From Barron's ● May 15, 2026
As I approach the O’Hare exit on I-294, Dr. Becky says, “More than anything, your kid needs you to become a sturdy pilot during their emotional turbulence,” and everything both crescendos and collapses.
From Slate ● May 10, 2026
In previous films “The Big Sick” and “Spoiler Alert,” the writer-director managed to tee up more than a few last-minute emotional crescendos.
From Salon ● Dec. 3, 2025
That line appears in the viciously-titled The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived, a song that opens with a weary sigh but crescendos with anger and paranoia.
From BBC ● Apr. 19, 2024
She flashes me a smile, and the world spins—chairs stretch into colorful putty, laughter crescendos in peaks, and the floor beneath my feet wobbles like the land is melting out from under me.
From "The Belles" by Dhonielle Clayton
Zardoya’s yearning for a love lost crescendoes, and is most devastating, in the piano ballad “Back to You”; but it seems as though even her darkest, most melancholic moments are touched by the fae.
From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 16, 2025
As Bannon walks through dilapidated neighborhoods in slo-mo, the cyclical music crescendoes, and “American Dharma” develops a searing, operatic tone complimented by the recurring image of a burning flag.
From Salon ● Sep. 6, 2018
TAOYUAN, Taiwan — As the batter steps to the plate, the clamor crescendoes, a rhyming, thumping chant, often tailored to his name.
From New York Times ● Aug. 5, 2018
As the crew struggles to replace it, the storm crescendoes, plucking 's anchor from the seabed twice before it can be secured again.
From Nature ● Sep. 4, 2013
He makes them dance for his pleasure, and you hear their breath come and go, in the swell and subsiding of those marvellous crescendoes and diminuendoes which set the strings pulsating like a sea.
From Plays, Acting and Music A Book Of Theory by Symons, Arthur
As “Turn the Lights Back On” crescendoed, the crowd sang along earnestly.
From Seattle Times ● May 25, 2024
The roars crescendoed when Gauff was introduced before play began.
From Washington Times ● Sep. 5, 2023
As NRP donations increased in the U.S., debate emerged in spurts and crescendoed this spring.
From Science Magazine ● May 11, 2023
Both of those 1980s-era properties crescendoed over four films, with initial ticket sales for each new offering exceeding the last.
From New York Times ● Mar. 26, 2023
As the song crescendoed, a row of daisies poked up from the dirt and unfurled toward her hands.
From "Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children" by Ransom Riggs
As someone who works in food, I see two main reasons behind all this crescendoing pressure.
From Salon ● Dec. 2, 2025
Vampire is just as good, masquerading as a piano ballad before Rodrigo unleashes on the titular blood-sucker with a series of venomous put-downs and crescendoing high notes.
From BBC ● Dec. 29, 2023
She married Michael Jackson, just as concerns about his behavior with children were crescendoing, and his efforts to remake his face were intensifying.
From Washington Post ● Jan. 13, 2023
The film delicately captures the flickers of possibility Dung and Linh Phung kindle in each other before crescendoing to an unexpected final act interwoven with a thrilling cai luong performance.
From New York Times ● Oct. 21, 2022
I miss her laugh, the way it starts like a pianists solo, soft and low and then crescendoing and filling the room.
From "Betty Before X" by Ilyasah Shabazz and Renée Watson
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.
