Definitions

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective music Having multiple, simultaneous rhythms

Etymologies

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Examples

  • The Fender Rhodes suitcase piano features a stereo tremolo and many other electric pianos have a simple, but quite obtrusive, mono tremolo that can introduce a strange kind of polyrhythmic feel to performances.

    Recently Uploaded Slideshows 2009

  • The performance of each song is delivered in a unique fashion involving spontaneous embellishment of the tune and polyrhythmic hand clapping.

    The Bushman Way of Tracking God PhD Bradford Keeney 2010

  • Getty Images Ballak é Sissoko, a Mali kora player, and French cellist Vincent Segal But not every act performing on the venue's three stages emphasizes hot, polyrhythmic dance numbers.

    Warm Up to a Meeting of Two Classical Minds Jim Fusilli 2011

  • This experimental film by a quartet of directors— Sam Fleischner , Willis Glasspiegel , Tony Lowe and Olivia Wyatt —captures the 2010 spectacle in wild bursts of color choreographed to a non-stop, polyrhythmic pulse.

    Documentary Dramas and Communist Comedies Steve Dollar 2011

  • Although Mr. Smith didn't fully solo until this last tune, throughout the set his polyrhythmic drumming evoked a movie with four subplots going at once, all of which, I'd be willing to wager, are better than the latest Harry Potter movie, even in 3D.

    The Sound Way Down in the Underground Will Friedwald 2011

  • Perhaps, though, "rooted" is the wrong word, since his whisper of a voice floats above his guitar and gentle polyrhythmic percussion to create an environment that's captivating, quietly insistent and delicate but not fragile.

    A Citizen of World Music Jim Fusilli 2011

  • Yet quintet's performances, even more than the material, are completely timeless: Mr. Peplowski's tenor saxophone trio reading (with just bass and polyrhythmic drums) of "It's a Lonesome Old Town" (from 1930, probably the newest song in the set) is both breathless and breathy, and as modern as Sonny Rollins , Joe Lovano or any other contempo-tenor you could name.

    Music With All the Fixings Will Friedwald 2011

  • Consisting of artists Jeff Donaldson, Wadsworth Jarrell, Barbara Jones-Hogu, and Nelson Stevens, AfriCOBRA's signature art is self-described as paintings made in "Koolaid colors" and "jazzy, polyrhythmic movements," a kind of "visual music" and "synesthetic ideas" related to Kandinsky's theories on sound and color.

    G. Roger Denson: You Say You Want a Revolution. Well You Know, Art Can Cure You of That G. Roger Denson 2011

  • Coincidentally, the set was book-ended by show tunes, beginning with a densely polyrhythmic "From This Moment On."

    On a Mission for Tradition Will Friedwald 2011

  • Consisting of artists Jeff Donaldson, Wadsworth Jarrell, Barbara Jones-Hogu, and Nelson Stevens, AfriCOBRA's signature art is self-described as paintings made in "Koolaid colors" and "jazzy, polyrhythmic movements," a kind of "visual music" and "synesthetic ideas" related to Kandinsky's theories on sound and color.

    G. Roger Denson: You Say You Want a Revolution. Well You Know, Art Can Cure You of That G. Roger Denson 2011

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