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Definition of "chromatic" [chro•mat•ic]

  • Relating to colors or color. (adjective)
  • Relating to color perceived to have a saturation greater than zero. (adjective)
  • Music Of, relating to, or based on the chromatic scale. (adjective)
  • Music Relating to chords or harmonies based on nonharmonic tones. (adjective)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Use "chromatic" in a sentence
  • "The term chromatic derives from the Greek word chroma, meaning color."
  • "For today we chose to share with you this playful set of tea cup stools, which ranks high in chromatic but also originality."
  • "I would be curious to know whether composers who work with just intonation came to it through diatonicism and then realized how cool it would be to adapt it to chromaticism, or whether they were chromatic from the start and just continually dissatisfied with the equal-tempered results."