a. and sb. Music. Also 7 enarmonic, enharmonique, 8 -ick. [ad. L. enharmonic-us, Gr. ἐναρμονικός, f. ἐν in + ἁρμονία: see HARMONY. Cf. Fr. enharmonique.]
A. adj.
1. Pertaining to that genus, style, or scale of music current among the Greeks, in which an interval of two and a half tones was divided into two quarter tones and a major third.
[1597. T. Morley, Introd. Mus., Annot., Enharmonicum is that which riseth by diesis, diesis … and ditonus.]
1603. Holland, Plutarch’s Mor., 1252. These were the beginnings of the enharmonique [pr. eu-] Musicke.
1726. Swift, London strewed with Rarities, Wks. 1841, I. 827. He sings … with equal facility in the chromatic, enharmonic, and diatonic style.
1774. Steele, in Phil. Trans., LXV. 71. The enharmonic genus requires intervals of the diesis, or quarter tone.
1852. Fraser’s Mag., XLVI. 656. Greek music … in its most approved form, the enharmonic, proceeded by quartertones.
2. Pertaining to, or concerned with, intervals smaller than a semitone; esp. with reference to the interval between those notes (belonging to different keys), which in instruments of equal temperament are rendered by the same tone: e.g., between G♯ and A♭. Enharmonic change or modulation: see quots. 1879.
a. 1794. Sir W. Jones, Mus. Modes Hindus, in Asiat. Res., III. (1799), 75. Those, it seems, were the first enharmonick melodies.
1865. De Morgan, in Athenæum, No. 1975. 312/2. An enharmonic organ.
1879. Parry, in Grove, Dict. Mus., s.v. Change, Changes are … of three kinds…. 1. The Diatonic…. 2. The Chromatic…. 3. The Enharmonic, where advantage is taken of the fact that the same notes can be called by different names, which lead different ways, and consequently into unexpected keys.
fig. 1876. J. C. Morison, in Macm. Mag., XXXIV. 93. The modulation and enharmonic change with which writers of a totally different cast of genius … surprise the ear.
3. quasi-sb.
1883. Davenport, Elem. Music (1887), 30. Each of the three sounds [C, ♯B, ♭♭D] is called the Enharmonic of the one next above or below it alphabetically.
B. sb. pl. Enharmonic music.
1603. Holland, Plutarch’s Mor., Thus you see what were the first rudiments and beginnings of Enharmoniques [pr. Eu-].
1865. Pall Mall Gaz., 24 Nov., 10/1. Others seem sanguine that congregations can be got to sing anything—close enharmonics, perhaps.
Hence Enharmonical a. = prec. Enharmonically adv.
1751. Chambers, Cycl., s.v. Diesis, Enharmonical Diesis is the difference between a greater and lesser semi-tone.
1879. Sat. Mus. Rev., 6 Sept., 506. It roves through seven keys in fifteen bars, and such keys as G major, F minor, E flat, A flat minor, G flat major, F sharp major (enharmonically).
