twelve-tone

adjective

ˈtwelv-ˈtōn 

: of, relating to, or being serial music utilizing the 12 chromatic tones

Examples of twelve-tone in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Arnold Schoenberg’s music still challenges listeners, but his twelve-tone technique turns up in all sorts of unexpected places, from horror film scores to cartoons to jazz. — Philip Clark, The New York Review of Books, 22 May 2025

Notable modernists include Virginia Woolf (stream-of-consciousness novels), Pablo Picasso (cubism), Arnold Schoenberg (twelve-tone technique), and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe (International Style architecture). — Hazlitt, 10 Apr. 2024

The First Quartet precedes Schoenberg’s break from tonality; the Third is from his twelve-tone period. — Alex Ross, The New Yorker, 11 Mar. 2024

Word History

First Known Use

1926, in the meaning defined above

Rhymes for twelve-tone

• acetone
• anglophone
• baritone
• bourguignon
• buspirone
• chaperon
• chaperone
• cobblestone
• collarbone
• cornerstone
• cortisone
• dictaphone