How to Use syncopated in a Sentence
syncopated
adjective-
But over the course of his time there, the music of the town changes to a more syncopated, looser ragtime.
—Dave Quinn, PEOPLE.com, 6 Apr. 2022
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When Al was recording a jazz band and heard the drummer doing syncopated rhythms on his kick drum, Al put a mic on the kick.
—Randall Roberts, Los Angeles Times, 29 Apr. 2021
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There are also traces of hip-hop, jazz and syncopated rhythms.
—Gail Mitchell, Billboard, 12 July 2017
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From afar it’s like a syncopated cage, or a fragmented take on the modern towers to the north.
—John King, San Francisco Chronicle, 12 Oct. 2021
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Solving the crime requires our man to shuttle back in forth in time — syncopated time, of course.
—Adam Woog, The Seattle Times, 1 July 2017
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But at the end of the first short phrase, the clock can’t help having some fun, breaking up the boredom by throwing in a moment of syncopated rhythm.
—New York Times, 22 Apr. 2020
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Occasionally a few words in a voice-over pierce the syncopated rhythm of the drum.
—Washington Post, 19 Nov. 2021
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People danced and swayed to the syncopated jazz, the crowd pulsating and sweating.
—Christine Fernando, The Indianapolis Star, 30 Aug. 2020
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The LEOs are livelier, and their life is more syncopated.
—Andrew Blum, WIRED, 25 June 2019
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Then there's the trebly slice of the guitar, slashing away at the all-important syncopated off-beat.
—John Adamian, courant.com, 14 June 2017
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Cantering is where the rider squeezes with their lower legs and feet and then leans forward and clicks their tongue to get the get the horse to take three syncopated steps in each stride.
—Madison Smalstig, The Indianapolis Star, 1 July 2022
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Her music warps and scars the syncopated grooves, rap flows, and electronic jolts of modern pop.
—Spencer Kornhaber, The Atlantic, 8 Nov. 2019
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All the while, Reid counted along aloud, helping clap syncopated rhythms.
—Sabrina Leboeuf, Baltimore Sun, 16 Sep. 2022
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This upbeat and quirky musical style is known for its syncopated rhythm and speed.
—Lawrence Elizabeth Knox, Houston Chronicle, 25 Oct. 2017
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The Lally-Canty rhythm section offered a syncopated, lustily grooving backbone in contrast to the speed and thrash of punk up to that point.
—Giovanni Russonello, New York Times, 20 Mar. 2018
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Disco, which had started in black clubs and migrated to gay clubs, had a strong syncopated beat that everybody could move to.
—New York Times, 12 Mar. 2020
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Its syncopated contours and rat-a-tat percussion part bring to mind a Scott Joplin rag, and here Mr. Diehl applied a playful finesse.
—Brian Wise, WSJ, 5 Dec. 2018
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Cheers went up as the syncopated rhythm of reggaeton began.
—Emily Witt, The New Yorker, 26 July 2019
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The rest of the songs paint of a modern picture: choppy sequences, syncopated melodies on percussion and string and wind instruments.
—Cristina Jaleru, chicagotribune.com, 2 Oct. 2020
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That was handled by Alex Wright, who also invented a syncopated riff that became a theme throughout the song.
—Tom Roland, Billboard, 14 June 2022
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There's a strong New Orleans feel to several of the album's eight tracks, plenty of feel-good funk with syncopated rhythms, bright brass, greasy keyboard tones and raunchy guitar.
—Lawrence Specker, AL.com, 2 Feb. 2018
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The fact that Ryan is a first-rate hoofer, and the chemistry between him and Platt fuels their syncopated routines together, helps immensely.
—David Fear, Rolling Stone, 23 Sep. 2021
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Carey gets her bounce on with this syncopated, feel-good nod to female empowerment.
—Billboard Staff, Billboard, 5 Oct. 2020
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The five performers are no longer fresh-faced youths — their ages range from 39 to 47 — but the songs sound smooth and catchy, the choreography is syncopated and sharp, and projecting a boy-band vibe is second nature to them.
—Mary Colurso | McOlurso@al.com, al, 5 Sep. 2019
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These visual depictions of sound look like sonar images from the ocean floor, with multicolored peaks and valleys depicting a syncopated go-go beat, the blare of a siren and the whoosh of a Metrobus’s brakes.
—Washington Post, 20 July 2021
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My rhythm and stuff comes more from listening to Parliament/Funkadelic and syncopated kind of rhythmic singing and Otis Redding is a very rhythmic singer.
—Matt Wake, AL.com, 10 Apr. 2018
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Taking to the center of the field, Church appeared in a purple denim jacket playing his guitar to a slower, syncopated version of the anthem.
—Stephen Daw, Billboard, 7 Feb. 2021
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The pentatonic melodies and syncopated rhythms found within are some of the African influences that made the symphony a novel hybrid for its time.
—San Diego Union-Tribune, 25 Apr. 2022
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The second woman comes back, and there’s fantastic ensemble choreography—once again, very syncopated, very fast.
—Sam Needleman, The New York Review of Books, 10 June 2023
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Nearby, a drummer and pianist locked into a syncopated groove, following the beat of Yannick Nézet-Séguin, who was conducting while seated on an elevated platform.
—Seth Colter Walls, New York Times, 9 Apr. 2023
Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'syncopated.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.
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