syncopation

American  

[sing-kuh-pey-shuhn, sin-] / ˌsɪŋ kəˈpeɪ ʃən, ˌsɪn- /

noun

1. Music. a shifting of the normal accent, usually by stressing the normally unaccented beats.

2. something, as a rhythm or a passage of music, that is syncopated.

3. Also called counterpoint rhythm.  Also called counterpoint.  Prosody. the use of rhetorical stress at variance with the metrical stress of a line of verse, as the stress on and and of in Come praise Colonus' horses and come praise/The wine-dark of the wood's intricacies.

4. Grammar. syncope.

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syncopation British  

/ ˌsɪŋkəˈpeɪʃən /

noun

1. music

   1. the displacement of the usual rhythmic accent away from a strong beat onto a weak beat

   2. a note, beat, rhythm, etc, produced by syncopation

2. another word for syncope

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Other Word Forms

• nonsyncopation
  noun

Etymology

Origin of syncopation

1525–35; < Medieval Latin syncopātiōn- (stem of syncopātiō ), equivalent to Late Latin syncopāt ( us ) ( see syncopate) + -iōn- -ion

Explanation

If no one's dancing at the school dance, it might be time to ask the DJ to play some music with more syncopation, or a strong, distinct rhythm that makes you want to move. Jazz is the musical genre best known for syncopation, using rhythm and beats in unexpected ways to make exciting, finger-snapping music. Syncopation has been around for a lot longer than that, though — it pops up in works by Bach and Mozart, for example.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

syncopation

When she discovers the Spanish-speaking world of salsa, she is as drawn to its language as she is to its physicality—the urgent syncopation that makes the music undivorceable from the call to dance.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 21, 2026

This is bass-heavy dance music, full of funky syncopation and skittering drums, often played by Tom Skinner of jazz band Sons Of Kemet.

From BBC ● Mar. 4, 2026

Before long, she was able to do this with music recorded live in a studio with natural fluctuations, complex instrumentation and syncopation, meaning different beats were emphasized in different measures, Cook explained.

From Salon ● Jun. 7, 2025

The production is crystal clear, with rumbling bass, percolating syncopation and lovely acoustic guitars in the bridge.

From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 31, 2024

The reason it’s called synco-pa is that it is short for the word syncopation, which means to have a rhythm that is ‘off-beat’ or doesn’t fall right on the beats of a song.”

From "Music and the Child" by Natalie Sarrazin