tone (n.)

  1. the quality of a persons voice; he began in a conversational tone; he spoke in a nervous tone of voice

    [ Syn: tone of voice ]

  2. the quality of something (an act or a piece of writing) that reveals the attitudes and presuppositions of the author; the general tone of articles appearing in the newspapers is that the government should withdraw; from the tone of her behavior I gathered that I had outstayed my welcome'

  3. (linguistics) a pitch or change in pitch of the voice that serves to distinguish words in tonal languages; the Beijing dialect uses four tones'

  4. (music) the distinctive property of a complex sound (a voice or noise or musical sound); the timbre of her soprano was rich and lovely; the muffled tones of the broken bell summoned them to meet

    [ Syn: timbre , timber , quality ]

  5. the general atmosphere of a place or situation and the effect that it has on people; the feel of the city excited him; a clergyman improved the tone of the meeting; it had the smell of treason

    [ Syn: spirit , feel , feeling , flavor , flavour , look , smell ]

  6. a quality of a given color that differs slightly from another color; after several trials he mixed the shade of pink that she wanted

    [ Syn: shade , tint , tincture ]

  7. a notation representing the pitch and duration of a musical sound; the singer held the note too long

    [ Syn: note , musical note ]

  8. a steady sound without overtones; they tested his hearing with pure tones of different frequencies

    [ Syn: pure tone ]

  9. the elastic tension of living muscles, arteries, etc. that facilitate response to stimuli; the doctor tested my tonicity

    [ Syn: tonicity , tonus ]

  10. a musical interval of two semitones

    [ Syn: whole tone , step , whole step ]

    tone (v.)

  1. utter monotonously and repetitively and rhythmically; The students chanted the same slogan over and over again

    [ Syn: chant , intone ]

  2. vary the pitch of ones speech

    [ Syn: inflect , modulate ]

  3. change the color or tone of; tone a negative'

  4. change to a color image; tone a photographic image'

  5. give a healthy elasticity to; Lets tone our muscles

    [ Syn: tone up , strengthen ]

The dictionary is based on the WordNet Electronic Lexical Database.
WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2011 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.