hurdy-gurdy

[hur-dee-gur-dee, -gur-]

noun

plural

hurdy-gurdies 

1. a barrel organ or similar musical instrument played by turning a crank.

2. a lute- or guitar-shaped stringed musical instrument sounded by the revolution against the strings of a rosined wheel turned by a crank.

hurdy-gurdy

/ ˈhɜːdɪˈɡɜːdɪ /

noun

1. any mechanical musical instrument, such as a barrel organ

2. a medieval instrument shaped like a viol in which a rosined wheel rotated by a handle sounds the strings

Other Word Forms

• hurdy-gurdist noun
• hurdy-gurdyist noun

Word History and Origins

Origin of hurdy-gurdy¹

1740–50; variant of Scots hirdy-girdy uproar, influencedby hurly-burly

Word History and Origins

Origin of hurdy-gurdy¹

C18: rhyming compound, probably of imitative origin

Example Sentences

Plinking, cascading xylophone and marimba sounds and the nasal, pumping string tones of a hurdy-gurdy circle through “Walker,” a meditation on getting through grief that’s named after the songwriter Scott Walker.

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Soon after, all of us, freshly unmuted, recited a hurdy-gurdy version of the Serenity Prayer in something far less than unison.

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“Without you knowing about it, there can be hundreds or thousands of musical niches – from hurdy-gurdy players to kora players to pedal steel players.”

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We see how the early sketches and etchings of street beggars, half-naked women and hurdy-gurdy musicians transform later in his career into figures that populate his biblical scenes.

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The show will offer a musical history of the waterway, performed on period instruments, including a hammered dulcimer, a banjo, a hurdy-gurdy and a squeeze box.

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