Definition, Meaning & Synonyms | English word PLECTRUM

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Definitions of PLECTRUM

1. (music) A small piece of plastic, metal, ivory, etc., for plucking the strings of a guitar, lyre, mandolin, etc.
2. (anatomy, zoology) A projection of bone or other stiff tissue, such as the ridges in some insects' stridulatory organs.

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Examples of Using PLECTRUM in a Sentence

• This activates a row of levers that turn a trigger mechanism that plucks one or more strings with a small plectrum made from quill or plastic.
• Musicians play some string instruments, like guitars, by plucking the strings with their fingers or a plectrum (pick), and others by hitting the strings with a light wooden hammer or by rubbing the strings with a bow, like violins.
• For hand-held instruments such as guitars and mandolins, the plectrum is often called a pick and is held as a separate tool in the player's hand.
• It contrasts with earlier styles such as minstrel, classic, or parlor style (a late 19th-century finger-style played without picks), clawhammer/frailing/two-finger style (played with thumb and nail of the first or middle finger), jazz styles played with a plectrum, and more modern styles such as Keith/melodic/chromatic/arpa style and single-string/Reno style.
• The mechanism is typically that of one structure with a well-defined lip, ridge, or nodules (the "scraper" or plectrum) being moved across a finely-ridged surface (the "file" or stridulitrum—sometimes called the pars stridens) or vice versa, and vibrating as it does so, like the dragging of a phonograph needle across a vinyl record.
• What the plectrum is made of also changes the texture, with ivory and plastic plectrums creating a more resilient texture to the wooden plectrum's twangy hum.
• His hymn Da, puer, plectrum (including "Corde natus ex parentis": "Of the Father's Love Begotten") and the hymn for Epiphany O sola magnarum urbium ("Earth Has Many A Noble City"), both from the Cathemerinon, are still in use today.
• The fifth finger of the musician's right hand rests lightly on the string at one of seven commonly used nodes, while the thumb and index finger pluck the string using a long plectrum.
• Fingerstyle guitar is the technique of playing the guitar or bass guitar by plucking the strings directly with the fingertips, fingernails, or picks attached to fingers, as opposed to flatpicking (plucking individual notes with a single plectrum, commonly called a "pick").
• The chanzy is played strumming - by sweeping the thumb or a plectrum up or down across the strings - (usually only the first string is fingered, the other string(s) are drones), to accompany Overtone singing.
• Domra, a small three- or four-stringed Russian variant of the mandolin with a rounded soundboard, plucked or strummed with a plectrum.
• Compared to other plucking techniques, any group of strings brushed in a single sweep by a plectrum could be considered a strum due to the plectrum's less precise string group targeting (however, a plectrum might simultaneously pluck a small group of strings without being considered a strum).
• Vega also acquired the plectrum instrument division of Boston's Thompson & Odell Company, which made bowl-back mandolins, guitars, and several types of banjos.
• Lutes are an extremely important part of Badakhshani music, especially the three-stringed shortneck lute played with a wooden plectrum; this is called the Pamiri rubab.
• The accompaniment music is a rondalla: an ensemble of stringed instruments (guitar, bandurria, and banjo), played with the plectrum.
• The main purpose of the pickguard is to protect the guitar's finish from being scratched by the nails of the picking hand, as it was included on guitars not played with a plectrum.
• Suggested by the rag's dedication to "James Brown and his Mandolin Club", author Rudi Blesh wrote that "some of the melodies recall the pluckings and the fast tremolos of the little steel-stringed plectrum instruments".
• Five gut strings, knotted round the bar and raised from the soundboard by means of a bridge tailpiece similar to that in use on the modern guitar, are plucked by means of a plectrum by the right hand for the melody, while the left hand sometimes twangs some of the strings as a soft drone accompaniment.
• While the use of a plectrum is common in many musical traditions, the exact term "flatpicking" is most commonly associated with Appalachian music of the American southeastern highlands, especially bluegrass music, where string bands often feature musicians playing a variety of styles, both fingerpicking and flatpicking.
• Guitar strings may be plucked individually with a pick (plectrum) or fingertip, or strummed to play chords.

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