Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. Variant of shamisen.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. A guitar or banjo of three strings, used by the Japanese.
Wiktionary
- n. Alternative form of shamisen.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. (Mus.) A Japanese musical instrument with three strings, resembling a guitar or banjo.
WordNet 3.0
- n. a Japanese stringed instrument resembling a banjo with a long neck and three strings and a fretted fingerboard and a rectangular soundbox; played with a plectrum
Examples
“The geisha, with her face whitened with powder, and her lips painted a bright red, and her elaborately-dressed hair full of ornaments, sits down to a sort of guitar called a samisen and sings, but her song has no music in it.”
“Tak Shindo takes Western-Themed standards and rearranges them to feature classic Oriental instruments such as samisen, koto, gong, flute, temple blocks, and tree cymbals. ...”
“Sugiyama however is captured and with his family meets a filthy torture death and I don't mean waterboarding, stress positions or loud samisen music, however he will not betray Toranaga-sama by withdrawing his resignation and allowing him to be impeached and invited to commit seppuku.”
“Many bunraku fan sites, such as the blogs Mannaka Na Hibi (kayabatyou. blog11.fc2.com) and Yoshida Tamame San Ouen (tamamefun. seesaa.net), are linked to sites of reciters, puppeteers and even samisen players.”
“A bell rings, the lights dim and a samisen (a three-stringed lute) starts to play as the performance of "Shinjû Ten no Amijima" (Double Suicide at Amijima Temple) begins.”
“The samisen player leaves, too, but not before she removes the screen in the corner to reveal a futon, the top quilt folded back in invitation.”
“The wizened grandma in the corner strikes up a geisha love song on her samisen.”
“She remembered being a young girl at the Dontaku Festival, the street full of people in bright-colored costumes playing samisen and beating drums.”
“Watch for his great piece on Appalacian samisen. . .”
“The one objection to my room is that to get either in or out of it I must pass through the other, which is occupied by five tobacco merchants who are waiting for transport, and who while away the time by strumming on that instrument of dismay, the samisen.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘samisen’.
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Logolepsy
"Luciferous Logolepsy is a collection of over 9,000 obscure English words. Though the definition of an 'English' word might seem to be straightforward, it is not. There exist so many adopted, deriv...
Anschauung, Areopagus, Argus, Briarean, Dei gratia, Dei judicium, Deo volente, Duecento, Foehn, Geflugelte Worte, Gegenschein, Hakenkreuz and 9230 more...
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The Japanese art of...
Words with definitions beginning with "The Japanese art of..." (or equivalent).
origami, kirigami, furoshiki, ikebana, makimono, ukiyo-e, netsuke, chindōgu, bonsai, naginatajutsu, butoh, Buyō and 30 more...
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A Second Helping of Random Palavery
A continuation of my first list, "A Serving of Random Palavery". Like the first, this list contains words that catch my attention, ring happily in my ears, are fun to speak, or are interesting to ...
bouffoir, mossberry, webisode, barquette, brochidodromous, festooned brochid..., eucamptodromy, eucamptodromous, loment, keenings, moss-trooper, mosstrooping and 138 more...
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Zing Went the Strings
lute, guitar, mandolin, violin, banjo, balalaika, sitar, pipa, autoharp, zither, kantele, guqin and 329 more...
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string alongs (and shorts too)
string instruments and instrumentation
zither, guitar, bouzouki, rebec, violin, cithara, fiddle, fidicinal, twang, fret, gadulka, maqui and 54 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for samisen.
reesetee Thanks, hernesheir! Jan 6, 2009
hernesheir another stringed instrument... Jan 6, 2009