ballet

Pluralballets (some meanings)

Formsballets, balleting, balleted

1. 1
   noununcountable

   A classical form of dance marked by precise, codified technique and graceful, flowing movement.

   Classical ballet demands extraordinary discipline and physical control from its dancers.

   He trained in ballet before moving into modern choreography.

   Note

   The root sense, and the place for the word's history: English took it from French, which had it from Italian balletto, a "short dance," the diminutive of ballo, a group dance, from Late Latin ballō, "to dance." The form rests on turnout from the hips, five fundamental foot positions and a vocabulary of steps named largely in French. Used before another noun, it gives the everyday ballet dancer.

2. 2
   nouncountable

   A theatrical performance of classical dancing, usually set to music and sometimes telling a story.

   The company premiered a new ballet based on a famous novel.

   Tickets for the holiday ballet sold out within hours.

   Note

   A ballet is a single work, something a company premieres or revives. The ballet, with the article, is the art as a night out, as in let's go to the ballet tomorrow. Keep both apart from the dancing company, where the ballet names the people on stage rather than what they perform.

3. 3
   nouncountable

   The troupe of dancers who perform classical dance together as one organized company.

   The national ballet toured five countries this season.

   He danced with the Russian ballet for over a decade.

   Similarcompany, troupe

4. 4
   nounfigurativelycountable or uncountable

   A complex, carefully coordinated series of actions among people, suggesting the precision of dancers.

   The kitchen during dinner service was a frantic ballet of cooks and waiters.

   Docking the spacecraft required a precise ballet of thrusters and timing.

   Similardance, choreography

   Note

   The figure usually comes with a word naming the setting or the mood. Examples include a kitchen ballet of shifted pans and shaken grates, or Stephen King's "oddly delicate ballet known as On-Scene Investigation" in Needful Things (1991). It can admire teamwork or tease it. King's phrase makes a grim routine sound graceful, and the gap between the two is the joke.

5. 5
   verbtransitive or intransitive

   To move or carry something with the grace and fluidity reminiscent of a dancer.

   Skilled waiters ballet between the tables without spilling a single drop.

   The crane operator balleted the steel beam into place high above the street.

   Similarglide, dance, waltz

   Note

   A verb made straight from the classical dance, and it stretches far: a contestant can ballet her way to a trophy, unfocused eyes can go balleting, and vascular surgeons write of graft limbs "balleting." The way-construction (ballet one's way to, like dance one's way to) is the easiest use to borrow. Its forms keep a single t: balleted, balleting.

6. 6
   nouncountable

   A light song written for several voice parts, often with a 'fa-la-la' refrain, popular among Elizabethan and Italian Renaissance composers.

   Morley's most famous ballet is still performed by choirs today.

   The singers rehearsed a Renaissance ballet for the spring concert.

   Note

   The musician's ballet is sung, not danced, though its name comes from the same Italian balletto behind the dance itself. These were light, dance-like part-songs, usually strophic and chordal in texture, with a fa-la-la refrain closing each verse. The form is closely tied to Gastoldi and to Morley, and choirs still sing it under this name.

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