Ostinato

Definition: Ostinato

Ostinato

Noun

1. A musical phrase repeated over and over during a composition.

Crosswords: Ostinato

English words defined with "ostinato": Riff. (references)

Non-English Usage: "Ostinato" is also a word in the following language with English translations in parentheses.

Italian (determined, headstrong, obdurate, obstinate, opinionated, persistent, pigheaded, self willed, single minded, stiff necked, stubborn, tough).

Ostinato, an Italian word meaning "stubborn" (compare English obstinate), is to classical music what riffs are to popular music.

An ostinato is a bit of melody, a chord progression, or a bass figure that is repeated over and over at the same pitch. Ostinato is frequently used in Baroque music, where the basso continuo invites the use of the technique, and fixed forms such as the passacaglia and the chaconne require it. The left hand in boogie woogie piano playing is another.

See also Alberti bass.

Domain	Usage
Movie/TV Titles	Ostinato (1968)
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits.

Domain	Title
Books	Austinato - An Ostinato Jambore (reference) Il lettore ostinato : libri, biblioteche, scuole, mass-media (reference) Ostinato (reference) Ostinato : roman (reference) Québec ostinato : pamphlet (reference) (more book examples)

Periodicals	Ostinato (reference) (more periodical examples) (more classical music examples; more popular music examples)
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits.

Play	Caption	Play	Caption
	Piano chords, steel drums, and rhythmic ostinato percussion. .		Ostinato bass with a ride cymbal percussion for a short minor blues piano solo.
	Metallic and low drums playing an ostinato pattern for a synthesized flute melody.		Ostinato bass line with a dramatic synthesizer, strings, and percussion texture.
	Quick Latin pop dance style with ostinato bass and synthesized flute melody.		Synthesized flute playing with guitar arpeggiated accompaniment and low drum ostinato.
	A techno-influenced ostinato passage very reminiscent of mid-1980's techno.
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits.

"Ostinato" is generally used as a noun (singular) -- approximately 100.00% of the time. "Ostinato" is used about 20 times out of a sample of 100 million words spoken or written in English. Its rank is based on over 700,000 words used in the English language. Some parts-of-speech are not covered due to the samples used by the British National Corpus. (note: percents less than one-hundredth of one percent have been omitted)

Parts of Speech	Percent	Usage per 100 Million Words	Rank in English
Noun (singular)	100%	20	78,262

Hypenated Usage
	Ending with "ostinato": multiple-ostinato.
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits.

The following statistics estimate the number of searches per day across the major English-language search engines as identified by various trade publications. Hyperlinks lead to commercial use of the expression at Amazon.com.

Derivations
	Words beginning with "ostinato": ostinatos. (additional references)
Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references).

# of Phoneme Matches	Pronunciation	Word(s) rhyming with "ostinato" (pronounced Ä'stunÄ"tō')
3	-Ä" t ō'	grotto, legato, Lotto, Otto, staccato.
Source: compiled by the editor (additional references); see credits.

Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams
	Words within the letters "a-i-n-o-o-s-t-t"
	-1 letter: station.
	-2 letters: stotin, taints, tanist, titans.
	-3 letters: antis, iotas, ostia, ottos, saint, santo, satin, snoot, stain, stint, stoai, stoat, tains, taint, tanto, tints, titan, toast, toits, toons, toots.
	-4 letters: ains, aits, anis, anti, ants, into, ions, iota, naoi, naos, nits, nota, oast, oats, onto, oots, otto, sain, sati, snit, snot, soon, soot, stat, stoa.
	Words containing the letters "a-i-n-o-o-s-t-t"
	+1 letter: dotations, notations, ostinatos, potations, rotations.
	+2 letters: autonomist, cartoonist, flotations, outstation, quotations, taxonomist.
	+3 letters: abortionist, adoptionist, anastomotic, annotations, anorthosite, anthologist, antiprotons, automations, autonomists, cartoonists, coaptations, cogitations, corotations, cottontails, denotations, detonations, etiolations, floatations, forestation, geobotanist, intonations, molestation, motivations, negotiators, nonbotanist, obturations, ostentation, outboasting, outstations, postulation, prostration, protagonist, restoration, taphonomist, taxonomists, tobacconist, tobogganist, tolerations, workstation.
	+4 letters: abolitionist, abortionists, adoptionists, anorthosites, anorthositic, anthologists, antiboycotts, antimosquito, antiozonants, atomizations, botherations, coalitionist, coarctations, commutations, computations, concomitants, confutations, connotations, constipation, consultation, contestation, continuators, contractions, contraptions, deportations, distortional, emotionalist, erotizations, exhortations, exportations, fomentations, forestations, gastronomist, geobotanists, importations, isolationist, misquotation, molestations, mountaintops, negotiations, nematologist, nonbotanists, occultations, operationist, optimisation, orientations, orthodontias, ostentations, ostentatious, phonotactics, photostating, postabortion, postromantic, postulations, potentiators, prostrations, protagonists, protestation, protonations, protractions, restorations, retroactions, solicitation, somatostatin, somatotropin, strobilation, taphonomists, tobacconists, tobogganists, trapshooting, wollastonite, workstations.
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark. All intellectual property rights in and to the game are owned in the U.S.A and Canada by Hasbro Inc., and throughout the rest of the world by J.W. Spear & Sons Limited of Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, a subsidiary of Mattel Inc. Mattel and Spear are not affiliated with Hasbro.