Meaning & use
percussion
Last updated
Musical instruments played by striking or shaking, such as drums and cymbals, or the section of an orchestra that plays them.
See it in a sentence
The marching band's percussion section kept the crowd's energy high.
She studied percussion for years before switching to piano.
A note on using this word
Also used in medicine to describe tapping on the body to diagnose conditions by sound, a much less common sense of the word.
Another way to use it
2. noun
The act of striking one object against another, especially as a diagnostic technique in medicine.
The doctor used percussion on the patient's chest to check for fluid in the lungs.
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