tacet means an instruction indicating silence on the part of the performers of a piece. It carries an Arena rating of 1779, earned across 48 head-to-head judged battles.
Among words judged in Lexicurio's Arena, tacet ranks #14 of 17,126 for Most Elegant Words, #1,595 of 17,149 for Most Exacting Words, #4,279 of 17,130 for Most Beautiful Words, #5,019 of 17,132 for Most Betrayed by Its Sound.
tacet is pronounced /ˈteɪ.sɪt/.
Why “tacet” is a great word
TACET — [Verb] An instruction in a musical score directing that an instrument or voice remain silent for a passage, movement, or entire section. Borrowed from Latin tacet ("it is silent"), third-person singular present active indicative of tacēre ("to be silent"). Unlike "tacit" (which denotes an unspoken understanding) or a "rest" (which measures a specific beat of silence within an active part), *tacet* is an explicit, wholesale command for absence. It is the viola waiting in the dark while the cello sings a solo, the trumpet left cold on the player's lap, and the choir holding its collective breath—a prescribed void that gives shape to the sound around it, formalizing a quiet so profound it becomes its own kind of music.
Etymology
Borrowed from Latin tacet (“it is silent”), third-person singular present active indicative form of taceō (“to be silent”). Doublet of tacit.
verb
- An instruction indicating silence on the part of the performers of a piece.
Definitions & examples from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 3.0).
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