musical chairs
Americannoun
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Also called going to Jerusalem. a game in which players march to music around two rows of chairs placed back to back, there being one chair less than the number of players, the object being to find a seat when the music stops abruptly. The player failing to do so is removed from the game, together with one chair, at each interval.
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Informal. a situation or series of events in which jobs, decisions, prospects, etc., are changed with confusing rapidity.
noun
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a party game in which players walk around chairs while music is played, there being one fewer chair than players. Whenever the music stops, the player who fails to find a chair is eliminated
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any situation involving a number of people in a series of interrelated changes
Etymology
Origin of musical chairs
First recorded in 1875–80
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.
There are plenty of ways to account for this upset, from polling errors to the musical chairs at the ballot box to Hong’s failure to spend basically any money on TV ads.
From Slate ● Aug. 17, 2026
"It is a permanent musical chairs," Bourdon added.
From Barron's ● Aug. 15, 2026
An uncomfortable game of musical chairs is playing out on Wall Street.
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 8, 2026
One quip was about how the BBC plays the children’s game musical chairs: “When the music stops, they put in another chair.’
From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 17, 2025
It was like we were playing musical chairs, with everyone scrambling to get a seat.
From "Auggie & Me" by R. J. Palacio
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.
