cadence

noun

1. (countable, uncountable)The act or state of declining or sinking.

   “Now was the sun in western cadence low.”

2. (countable, uncountable)The measure or beat of movement.

   “Getting into a good jigging rhythm means making short quick jerks in a regular cadence that might average about one jerk every 1.5 to 2 seconds.”

3. (countable, uncountable)Balanced, rhythmic flow.

   “You find not the apostrophas, and so miss the accent: let me supervise the canzonet. Here are only numbers ratified; but, for the elegancy, facility, and golden cadence of poesy, caret.”

   “Night has now passed in the Saudi desert and as we hear from Nightline correspondent Forrest Sawyer, the normal cadence of life at the front is about to change.”

4. (countable, uncountable)The general inflection or modulation of the voice, or of any sound.

   “Blustering winds, which all night long / Had roused the sea, now with hoarse cadence lull / Seafaring men o'erwatched.”

   “The accents […] were in passion's tenderest cadence.”

   “Then away at last they sped to the house or bedside of some elderly and worthy person, and Pym sat fascinated to see how swiftly Rick trimmed his manner to suit theirs, how naturally he slipped into the cadences and vernacular that put them most at ease, and how the love of God came into his good face when he talked about Liberalism and Masonry and his dear dead father, God rest him, and a firstclass rate of return, ten percent guaranteed plus profits for as long as you're spared.”

   “The cadence of Raimey's voice is pure Down-Easter Maine”

5. (countable, uncountable)A progression of at least two chords which conclude a piece of music, section or musical phrases within it. Sometimes referred to analogously as musical punctuation.
6. (countable, uncountable)A cadenza, or closing embellishment; a pause before the end of a strain, which the performer may fill with a flight of fancy.
7. (countable, uncountable)A fall in inflection of a speaker’s voice, such as at the end of a sentence.
8. (countable, uncountable)A dance move which ends a phrase.

   “The cadence in a galliard step refers to the final leap in a cinquepace sequence.”

9. (countable, uncountable)The rhythm and sequence of a series of actions.
10. (countable, uncountable)The number of steps per minute.
11. (countable, uncountable)The number of revolutions per minute of the cranks or pedals of a bicycle.
12. (countable, uncountable)A chant that is sung by military personnel while running or marching; a jody call.

    “call cadence”

13. (countable, uncountable)Cadency.
14. (countable, uncountable)Harmony and proportion of movement, as in a well-managed horse.
15. (countable, uncountable)The number of strides per second of a racehorse, measured when the same foot/hoof strikes the ground
16. (countable, uncountable)The frequency of regular product releases.

    “In this third case, releasing more frequently, the PSI cadence becomes a planning cadence, rather than a release cadence.”

    “We recommend aiming for a release cadence of no more than six months, with a goal of getting it down to three months or shorter.”

    “This happens when the installation cadence in production is slower than the release cadence of the development teams.”

verb

1. (transitive)To give a cadence to.

   “there was besides, in an already dominating and growing element, a motive that was stronger and more enduring than enthusiasm —an implacable antagonism which acted side by side with the cause of the Union as a perpetual impelling force against the social conditions of the South, controlling the counsels of the government, and cadencing the march of its armies to the chorus: John Brown's body lies mouldering in the grave, But his soul is marching on!”

   “In this march to the City of the Dead," scores upon scores of the best musical organizations of the nation were in line, whose funeral dirges cadenced' the great wail of a bereft people.”

   “Example 10a gives a melody for one endecasyllabic line of verse; there are various ways of utilizing it, including Rore's choice of cadencing the first line on the third scale degree, for a two-line segment of an ottava stanza.”

2. (transitive)To give structure to.

   “It was the Exile, however, which cadenced the rhythm of Jewish existence”

   “They are neither mentioned specifically in the Constitution, nor in the Federalist Papers that cadenced the nationalist debates.”

   “... an idea taken up by Percier and Fontaine, who also supplied the Corinthian order and transverse arcades cadencing the gallery's length today”

name

1. A female given name from English.