syncopation

[ sing-kuh-pey-shuhn, sin- ]

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. syncopated.
3. 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.

syncopation

/ 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

Other Words From

• nonsyn·co·pation noun

Word History and Origins

Origin of syncopation¹

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