recital
Americannoun
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recitals
plural
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a musical entertainment given usually by a single performer or by a performer and one or more accompanists.
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a similar entertainment in a field other than music.
a dance recital.
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a program or concert by dance or music students to demonstrate their achievements or progress.
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an act or instance of reciting.
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a formal or public delivery of something memorized.
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a detailed statement.
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an account, narrative, or description.
He gave a recital of the things he'd been doing since we'd last seen him.
noun
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a musical performance by a soloist or soloists Compare concert
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the act of reciting or repeating something learned or prepared
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an account, narration, or description
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a detailed statement of facts, figures, etc
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(often plural) law the preliminary statement in a deed showing the reason for its existence and leading up to and explaining the operative part
Synonym Usage
See narrative.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of recital
Explanation
The hardest part about piano lessons is having to give a recital, or to demonstrate what you've learned in front of an audience. You can also use the noun recital to describe the telling of a story. Your uncle might be famous for boring people at parties with his recital of youthful Boy Scout adventures, for example. In the 1500s, recital was strictly a legal term, the "statement of relevant facts," but the musical meaning had come into use by the 1800s. The root is the Latin word recitare, "repeat from memory."
Vocabulary lists containing recital
Matilda
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Drama
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On the Come Up
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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:
By all accounts, they were a deeply devoted couple: Peter said he wrote with Lorraine’s voice in mind, while she included music by her husband in every recital.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 28, 2026
He gave his last recital from memory at age 94.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 29, 2026
That recital began a day the likes of which no British royal has experienced in centuries.
From BBC ● Feb. 20, 2026
A highlight was to have been a pair of songs by León, with texts by Kevin Young, written for the recital, but they were apparently not yet ready.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 19, 2026
Even as the horrid recital continued, two guards came out of the bunkers, carrying between them the form of a man.
From "The Hiding Place" by Corrie ten Boom
That means the absence is not only felt physically, missing birthdays, school recitals, and holidays like Father's Day, but also emotionally.
From BBC ● May 23, 2026
When she goes to the dance recitals, it’s clear that she can’t dance and we always ask her, “Do you know the dance?”
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 20, 2026
But her gifts were entirely her own, as attested to by this 20-disc collection of Deutsche Grammophon recordings, including her complete recitals for the label.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 23, 2025
No one likes those organ recitals about doctors missing critical signs and symptoms because they didn’t dig deep enough.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 18, 2025
The games and amusements that had passed the time for them on board Endurance were forgotten; no one had the heart for charades or poetry recitals or comic songs.
From "Shipwreck at the Bottom of the World" by Jennifer Armstrong
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.
