Melody
//ˈmɛl.ə.di// name, noun
name, noun ·Moderate ·College level
Definitions
Noun
- 1 A sequence of notes that makes up a musical phrase.
"Alyssa likes to sing melodies while playing the drums."
- 2 the perception of pleasant arrangements of musical notes wordnet
- 3 a succession of notes forming a distinctive sequence wordnet
Proper Noun
- 1 A female given name from English.
"Melody, for this, impossibly, was her mother's name, twinkled in a searching manner over the glasses."
- 2 A surname.
Example
More examples"The song had a melody that went like this."
Etymology
Etymology 1
From Middle English melodie, melodye, from Old French melodie, from Latin melodia, from Ancient Greek μελῳδίᾱ (melōidíā, “singing, chanting”), from μέλος (mélos, “musical phrase”) + ἀοιδή (aoidḗ, “song”), contracted form ᾠδή (ōidḗ).
Etymology 2
From the noun melody; in regular use since the 20th century.
Related phrases
More for "melody"
Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.