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either tragic or comic, of which music forms an essential part; a drama wholly or mostly sung, consisting of recitative, arials, choruses, duets, trios, etc., with orchestral accompaniment, preludes, and interludes, together with appropriate costumes, scenery, and action; a lyric drama.

divine event, elaborately set to music, in recitative, arias, grand choruses, etc., to be sung with an orchestral accompaniment, but without action, scenery, or costume, although the oratorio grew out of the Mysteries and the Miracle and Passion plays, which were acted.

One of the priests who organized or sung in parts. [Obs.]

Speaking; in a speaking or declamatory manner; to be sung or played in the style of a recitative.

fers from a madrigal in its exclusion of contrapuntual devices; from a glee, in its being sung by many voices, instead of by one only, to each part." Stainer & Barrett.

The Gregorian chant, or canto fermo; the prescribed melody of the Roman Catholic service, sung in unison, in tones of equal length, and rarely extending beyond the compass of an octave. (b) A simple melody. -- Plain speaking, plainness or bluntness of speech.

A hymn, or other selection, sung during a church procession; as, the processional was the 202d hymn.

To name in, or as, a proverb. [R.] Am I not sung and proverbed for a fool Milton.

An interval of a fifth; also, a part sung with such intervals. [Obs.] "He sang . . . a loud quynyble." Chaucer.

A group of five notes to be played or sung in the time of four of the same species.

ies of the Swiss mountaineers, blown on a long tube called the Alpine horn, and sometimes sung.

To send back; to reverberate. Silenus sung; the vales his voice rebound. Dryden.

Of or pertaining to recession or withdrawal. Recessional hymn, a hymn sung in a procession returning from the choir to the robing room.

A mass said or sung for the repose of a departed soul. We should profane the service of the dead To sing a requiem and such rest to her As to peace-parted souls. Shak.

ite shark (Carcharodon carcharias); -- so called on account of its causing requiems to be sung.

A short anthem sung at intervals during the reading of a chapter.

A versicle sung in answer to the priest, or as a refrain. Which, if should repeat again, would turn my answers into responsories, and beget another liturgy. Milton.

moothly running passage of short notes (as semiquavers, or sixteenths) uniformly grouped, sung upon one long syllable, as in Handel's oratorios.

A rondelay. "Sung all the roundel lustily." Chaucer. Come, now a roundel and a fairy song. Shak.

Grave; serious; solemn. [R.] "[Great bards.] in sage and solemn tunes have sung." Milton.