Word Finder - prelude

definition

An introductory or preliminary performance or event.

synonyms

• preface

definition

A short, free-form piece of music, originally one serving as an introduction to a longer and more complex piece; later, starting with the Romantic period, generally a stand-alone piece.

synonyms

• intrada
• overture

definition

A standard module or library of subroutines and functions to be imported, generally by default, into a program.

definition

A forerunner to anything.

definition

To introduce something, as a prelude.

definition

To play an introduction or prelude; to give a prefatory performance.

Obviously his remark was merely a prelude to a lecture.

This song forms a prelude to the chapters that follow.

The episode forms the prelude to family rivalries.

Many online games seem like a teaser and a prelude to get you to purchase a monthly subscription to feed your gaming frenzy.

On the other hand, Chronicles has a different story with a novel prelude.

Cambon's proud and vehement reply was the signal of the resistance to Robespierre's tyranny and the prelude to his fall.

It is true, nevertheless, that love as a prelude to marriage finds only a small place in Japanese ethics.

I currently live in Bexley, but would like to rent a houseboat as a prelude to buying one.

On Thursday, large numbers of American and British aircraft were destroying Iraqi air defenses as a prelude to ground incursions.

That became the prelude to Pat Finucane's killing.

This 5th century ' economic boom ' formed a prelude to the most remarkable phase of Byzantine history.

Against Everton even that might prove the prelude to a riot.

The orchestral prelude begins with hushed strings presenting the ' Judgment ' theme.

I like the G minor prelude and fugue, tho and few other bits and pieces.

They declare that this constitution is the necessary prelude to full political union.

All along mathematics was regarded by Descartes rather as the envelope than the foundation of his method; and the " universal mathematical science " which he sought after was only the prelude of a universal science of all-embracing character.2 The method of Descartes rests upon the proposition that all the objects of our knowledge fall into series, of which the members are more or less known by means of one another.

Consequently the efforts of Crispi and his envoy, Colonel Piano, to conclude a new treaty with Menelek in June 1894 not only proved unsuccessful, but formed a prelude to troubles on the Italo-Abyssinian frontier.

The theorems on the composition of forces in circular motion with which it concluded formed the true prelude to Newton's Principia, and would alone suffice to establish the claim of Huygens to the highest rank among mechanical inventors.

Astrolatry was, in Egypt, the prelude to astronomy.

I forms the prelude to Samuel's great victory and belongs to the history of Shiloh and the priesthood of Eli.

All too often, the time spent as a deacon is seen simply as the prelude to priestly ordination.

We're going to use a prelude by Bach, who usually sounds quite good on electronic instruments.

When reopening a callback window or code prelude window, it shows the previous contents of the window.

The game starts in traditional Bond style, with a high action prelude except this time you're in control from the get-go.

After resisting every attempt of the French court to draw him into the antiHabsburg league, Sobieski signed the famous treaty of alliance with the emperor Leopold against the Turks (March 31, 1683), which was the prelude to the most glorious episode of his life, the relief of Vienna and the liberation of Hungary from the Ottoman yoke.

Some vague recollection of known historical events (§ 3 end) might be claimed among the traditions ascribed to the closing centuries of the second millennium, but the view that the prelude to the monarchy was an era when individual leaders " judged " all Israel finds no support in the older narratives, where the heroes of the age (whose correct sequence is uncertain) enjoy only a local fame.

Britain, it was true, acting on the initiative of George Canning, had seized the Danish fleet, thus forestalling an action which Napoleon certainly contemplated; but on the other hand Denmark now allied herself with him; and while in Lombardy he heard of the triumphant entry of his troops into Lisbon - an event which seemed to prelude his domination in the Iberian Peninsula and thereafter in the Mediterranean.

Full closes and repeated sentences no longer confuse the issue, but in their absence we begin to notice the incessant squareness of the ostensibly free rhythms. The immense amount of pageantry, though (as in Tannhauser) good in dramatic motive and executed with splendid stage-craft, goes far to stultify Wagner's already vigorous attitude of protest against grand-opera methods; by way of preparation for the ethereally poetic end he gives us a disinfected present from Meyerbeer at the beginning of the last scene, where mounted trumpeters career round the stage in full blast for three long minutes; and the prelude to the third act is an outburst of sheer gratuitous vulgarity.

Where the orchestra shows that Parsifal is becoming half-conscious of his quest while Kundry is beguiling him with memories of his mother, - and also during the two changes of scene to the Hall of the Grail, where the orchestra mingles the agony of Amfortas and the sorrow of the knights with the tolling of the great bells, - the polyphony is almost as dramatic as in Tristan; while the prelude and the Charfreitagszauber are among the clearest examples of the sublime since Beethoven.

But this belongs to a later scheme (see Samuel), and the introduction in its earlier form must have been the prelude to earlier narratives.'

All were silent, expectant of what was to follow, for this was clearly only a prelude.

Ahh, but there was another fate destined for this rocky isle in the middle of bay, its previous history being just an inconsequential prelude.

Most promise rings are worn on the left hand, particularly if they are a prelude to a more elaborate engagement ring.

He appreciates romance as the prelude to passion and masterfully creates any romantic setting, be it a country picnic or an evening of fine dining.

His reconquest of Babylon in 520 may, in particular, have seemed the prelude to the Messianic age (Wellhausen, Gesch., p. 161 n.).

The only two points on which he departed from the orthodox Lutheran faith of his day were the requirement of regeneration as the sine qua non of the true theologian, and the expectation of the conversion of the Jews and the fall of Papacy as the prelude of the triumph of the church.

With all these precautions the best seed time is often missed, and this usually proves the prelude to a scanty crop, or to a late and disastrous harvest.

As a prelude to exit and to pay off bank borrowings we decided to float on the Stock Exchange.

Even if minority families agree to accept Arab nationality, their compliance is often only a prelude to further persecution.

In late seventeenth-century London, life might truly be described as a mere prelude to death.

The sudden, erratic swings of the pendulum during the 1990s were, therefore, the perfect prelude to the 2000 campaign.

Beethoven's Nine Symphonies; Berlioz's " Symphonie fantastique," " Harold en Italie "; Benediction et Serment (Benvenuto Cellini); Danse des Sylphes (Damnation de Faust); Weber's overtures, Der Freischiitz, Euryanthe, Oberon, Jubilee; Beethoven's and Hummel's Septets; Schubert's Divertissement a la Hongroise; Beethoven's Concertos in C minor, G and E flat (orchestra for a second piano); Wagner's Tannhauser overture, march, romance, chorus of pilgrims; Lohengrin, Festzug and Brautlied, Elsa's Brautgang, Elsa's Traum, Lohengrin's Verweiss an Elsa; Fliegender Hollander, Spinnlied; Rienzi, Gebet; Rheingold, Walhall; Meistersinger, " Am stillen Herd "; Tristan, Isolde's Liebestod; Chopin's six Chants Polonais; Meyerbeer's Schillermarsch; Bach's six organ Preludes and Fugues; Prelude and Fugue in G minor; Beethoven, Adelaide; 6 miscellaneous and 6 Geistliche Lieder; Liederkreis; Rossini's Les Soirees musicales; Schubert, 59 songs; Schumann, 13 songs; Mendelssohn, 8 songs; Robert Franz, 13 songs.

It was not worth while to master and economize the resources of this earth, to utilize the good and ameliorate the evils of this life, while every one agreed, in theory at any rate, that the present was but a bad prelude to an infinitely worse or infinitely better future.

Sonya struck the first chord of the prelude.

As a prelude to the match we went to Lodge Farm on Saturday to suss things out (see Stuart's match report).

The first work using the twelve-tone method, the Prelude of the Piano Suite, Op.

When the dog's internal organs begin to slow their functions in prelude to shutting down, the hunger impulse disappears completely.

In the 1990s, couples began to exchange diamond promise rings as a direct prelude to engagement rings, and other types of rings have become fashionable to represent different oaths.

Incidentally they are hastening the assimilation of the written and the spoken languages (genbun itchi) which may possibly prelude a still greater reform, abolition of the ideographic script.

Before, however, dealing with the relations between the British and the Boers subsequent to 1881 brief reference may be made to affairs in which other powers were concerned; affairs which were the prelude to the era of expansion associated with the career of Cecil Rhodes.