Crescendo
English Meaning
With a constantly increasing volume of voice; with gradually increasing strength and fullness of tone; -- a direction for the performance of music, indicated by the mark, or by writing the word on the score.
- Music A gradual increase, especially in the volume or intensity of sound in a passage.
- Music A passage played with a gradual increase in volume or intensity.
- A steady increase in intensity or force: "insisted [that] all paragraphs ... should be structured as a crescendo rising to a climactic last sentence” ( Henry A. Kissinger).
- Usage Problem The climactic point or moment after such a progression: "The attacks ... began in December ... and reached a crescendo during [the president's] September visit” ( Foreign Affairs).
- Gradually increasing in volume, force, or intensity.
- Music With a crescendo.
- To build up to or reach a point of great intensity, force, or volume: "The designer-name craze crescendoed in the mid-seventies” ( Bernice Kanner).
