OVERTURE • DICCIONARIO INGLES.COM • Definition of Overture

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/ˈoʊvərtʃər/ Listen

Overture

noun

Orchestral music played at the beginning of an opera or oratorio.

Something that serves as a preceding event or introduces what follows. Synonyms: preliminary, prelude. "Drinks were the overture to dinner"

A tentative suggestion designed to elicit the reactions of others. Synonyms: advance, approach, feeler.

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Etymology of 'Overture'

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"Overture" Quotes from Famous Books

... no trumpets that announce the Moor, No blast that makes the hero's welcome sure,— A single fiddle in the overture! ...

— Complete Poetical Works of Bret Harte • Bret Harte

... the hour had been no fault of hers—and the Mother Superior, alas! would be sure to make inquiries as to the friends whom she had visited—the magic violin of M. Szmera played its first notes, accompanied by Madame Odinska on the piano, and by a delicious little flute. They played an overture, the dreamy sweetness of which extorted cries of admiration ...

— Jacqueline, v3 • Th. Bentzon (Mme. Blanc)

... provisional or potential coercion in the proper case arising. One traitor cannot exist as a public and demonstrative character without many minor traitors to back him. To Great Britain it ought to cost no visible effort, resolutely and instantly to trample out every overture of insubordination as quietly, peacefully, effectually, as the meeting of conspirators at Clontarf on the 8th day of October 1843. Ireland is notoriously, by position and by imaginary grievances—grievances which, had they ...

— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 54, No. 337, November, 1843 • Various

... was extracted, as quite out of place, and sublimity was made to give way to a more temperate and stoical standard. In due time the Rationalists effected their purpose. Secular music was introduced into the sanctuary; an operatic overture generally welcomed the people into church, and a march or a waltz dismissed them. Sacred music was no longer cultivated as an element of devotion. The oratorios and cantata of the theatre and beer-garden were the Sabbath accompaniments of the sermon. The masses consequently ...

— History of Rationalism Embracing a Survey of the Present State of Protestant Theology • John F. Hurst

... remember these are dress concerts) on one of the benches, grumbling at most of the music. You had a long symphony of Beethoven's in B flat—I forget how it goes, but doubtless there was much good in it. The overture to Egmont is also a fine thing. The Atlas (which is the best weekly critic of Music and all other things that I know of) gives great [Greek text] to the Societa Armonica: especially this season, as the ...

— Letters of Edward FitzGerald - in two volumes, Vol. 1 • Edward FitzGerald

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