sharped

1. 1
   verb

   Simple past and past participle of sharp.

   The singer sharped the final phrase to add a little tension.

   The composer had sharped several notes in the revised score.

   Note

   The verb is regular and takes the note or phrase as its object, so it fits both active and passive musical description: she sharped the final phrase; the leading tone is sharped. The same spelling also serves the verb's other meanings, such as a dealer who sharped in bargaining or, in obsolete use, a blade sharped for cutting. Context decides which is meant. Placed before a noun, it becomes the adjective for altered notes.

2. 2
   adjective

   In music, raised in pitch by a semitone, so as to become a sharp note.

   The sharped seventh gave the melody an unexpected lift.

   A sharped fourth distinguishes the Lydian mode from the plain major scale.

   Similarraised

   Oppositeflattened

   Note

   A participle turned adjective, it usually comes before the interval or scale degree it alters: a sharped fourth, a sharped seventh. A note's name works differently and takes the plain adjective after it, as in F sharp. Because a note either carries the ♯ or does not, the word has no degrees. Nothing is more sharped or very sharped.

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