sonority
Americannoun
-
sonorities
plural
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of sonority
1515–25; < Medieval Latin sonōritās < Late Latin: melodiousness, equivalent to Latin sonōr ( us ) ( see sonorous) + -itās -ity
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:
The arresting analog engineering of the Royce Hall sessions are where you witness the marvelous Mehta Sound — where each sonority has a personality, even a kind of chutzpah.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 10, 2023
“This silvery, fluty, bell-like sonority that seemed to be everywhere and nowhere at once.”
From Washington Post ● Jun. 2, 2020
Shorter’s tenor saxophone anchors the three disks with a surreal sonority, a wild cry that comes from the heart of sorrow.
From The New Yorker ● Aug. 25, 2018
They are particularly appealing in the upper register, largely because they minimize falsetto, thus achieving what Mr. Paseltiner called “a trumpet-like” sonority.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 21, 2018
In his works we begin to enjoy orchestral effect for its own sake: the dashing vivacity of the strings, the mellowness of the wood-wind,103 the sonority and grandeur of the brass.
From Music: An Art and a Language by Walter Raymond Spalding
Isolated finger gestures, sometimes reaching upward, added telling small details to Mr. Morris’s choreographic momentum, which kept a heady pace with the composer’s insistently pounding, punchy sonorities.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 27, 2026
These consisted of a Rameau/Handel program, studies in luxuriant sonorities.
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 1, 2025
Since the 1990s we’ve grown accustomed to hip-hop importing and metabolizing the sonorities and techniques of jazz.
From New York Times ● Jul. 5, 2023
On this short, vivid release, he is credited with compositions and sound design, with no mention of the bass per se, even though he still supplies plenty of low-pitched sonorities here.
From New York Times ● Jan. 26, 2023
If we could listen to them all at once, fully orchestrated, in their immense ensemble, we might become aware of the counterpoint, the balance of tones and timbres and harmonics, the sonorities.
From "The Lives of a Cell" by Lewis Thomas
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.
