prelude

1. An introductory performance, event, or action preceding a more important one; a preliminary or preface.
2. Music.
   1. A piece or movement that serves as an introduction to another section or composition and establishes the key, such as one that precedes a fugue, opens a suite, or precedes a church service.
   2. A similar but independent composition for the piano.
   3. The overture to an oratorio, opera, or act of an opera.
   4. A short composition of the 15th and early 16th centuries written in a free style, usually for keyboard.

1. To serve as a prelude to.
2. To introduce with or as if with a prelude.

[Medieval Latin praelūdium, from Latin praelūdere, to play beforehand : prae-, pre- + lūdere, to play.]

(PREL-yood, PRAYL-, PRAY-lood, PREE-)

noun
1. An introductory event, performance, or action preceding something more important.
2. A musical section, overture, etc. serving as introduction to the main composition, opera, play, etc.
verb tr., intr.
To serve as an introduction to something.

Etymology
From Medieval Latin praeludium, from Latin praeludere (to play beforehand), from prae- (pre-) + ludere (to play). Ultimately from Indo-European root leid- (to play) that is also the ancestor of words such as allude, collude, delude, elude, illusion, and ludicrous

For more information on prelude, visit Britannica.com.

noun

A short section of preliminary remarks: foreword, induction, introduction, lead-in, overture, preamble, preface, prolegomenon, prologue. See start/end, words.

Definition: beginning of event
Antonyms: conclusion, ending, epilogue, postlude, postscript

(Fr. prélude; Ger. Vorspiel; It. preludio; Lat. praeludium, praeambulum)

An instrumental movement intended to precede a larger work or group of pieces. Preludes evolved from improvisations made by players to test the tuning, touch or tone of their instruments and by church organists to establish the pitch and mode of the music to be sung during the liturgy. The oldest to survive are in Adam Ileborgh's tablature of 1448, Paumann's Fundamentum organisandi (1452) and the Buxheim Orgelbuch (1460-70); 16th-century sources contain many more. Unattached preludes in an improvisatory style continued to be written after 1600, but during the 17th century and the first half of the 18th the prelude followed by a fugue or a suite of dances became the predominant type. The prelude and fugue is a mainly German form which reached its highest point of development in Bach's organ works and his ‘48’. The improvisatory element is absent from many of Bach's preludes but is to the fore in the Prélude non mesuré with which French composers often prefaced their suites.

Few preludes date from the Classical period, but the attached prelude reappeared in 19th-century Bach-influenced works such as Mendelssohn's Six Preludes and Fugues op.35, Liszt's Prelude and Fugue on B-A-C-H and Brahms's two preludes and fugues for organ. More typical of the Romantic period was the set of independent preludes for piano.Hummel's set of 24 ‘in the major and minor keys’ op.67 (c 1814-15) was followed by Chopin's op.28 (1836-9), which in turn served as a model for those of Heller (op. 81), Alkan (op. 31), Cui (op. 64) and Busoni (op. 37). Rakhmaninov's, although issued under three different opus numbers (3, 23 and 32), also embrace all 24 keys. The idea of a prelude as a non-programmatic characteristic piece for piano was taken up by such composers as Skryabin, Szymanowski, Shostakovich and Martinů. Debussy's two sets have descriptive titles, which are otherwise rare. His Prélude à l′après-midi d′un faune is an orchestral tone poem.

For chorale preludes, see Chorale.

"Play-before". An introductory movement or work.

A Prelude ("before play") is something that serves as a preceding event or introduces what follows after it. It may also refer to:

• Prelude (music), a musical style
• Prelude (band), an English based folk band
• The Prelude, a poem by William Wordsworth
• Preludes (poem), a poem by T. S. Eliot
• "Prelude" (short story), a short story by New Zealand author Katherine Mansfield
• Prelude Records (record label), a former New York-based dance independent record label
• Prelude Records, a specialist classical music CD shop in Norwich, England
• Honda Prelude, an automobile manufactured by Honda
• Prelude to Foundation, a novel in the Foundation series
• Prelude-IDS, open source hybrid IDS framework
• The Haskell Prelude, a standard module imported by default into Haskell programs

Music

'Prelude' is a very common term as a title of a musical piece, both classical and popular. Some specific Preludes are:

• Preludes (Chopin), a set of 24 piano pieces by Frédéric Chopin, written between 1835 and 1839
• Prelude in C-sharp minor (Rachmaninoff), a piano piece by Sergei Rachmaninoff, written in 1892
• Preludes (Debussy), two sets of piano pieces by Claude Debussy, written between 1909 and 1913
• Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune, an orchestral piece by Debussy
• Preludes - Rare and Unreleased Recordings, an album by Warren Zevon

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Dansk (Danish)
n. - indledning, præludium
v. tr. - indlede, præludere
v. intr. - fungere som indledning, udføre et præludium

Nederlands (Dutch)
inleiding, voorspel, prelude (muziek), iets dat vooraf gaat, inleiden, voorspelen

Français (French)
n. - (gén, Mus) prélude
v. tr. - préluder à, annoncer
v. intr. - préluder à

Deutsch (German)
n. - Auftakt, Vorspiel
v. - mit einem Präludium einleiten, eröffnen

Ελληνική (Greek)
n. - προοίμιο, εισαγωγή, πρόλογος, (μουσ.) πρελούδιο, προανάκρουσμα

Italiano (Italian)
introduzione, preludio

Português (Portuguese)
n. - prelúdio (m)

Русский (Russian)
прелюдия, вступление

Español (Spanish)
n. - preludio
v. tr. - preludiar
v. intr. - entretenerse en preliminares

Svenska (Swedish)
n. - förspel, inledning, upptakt

中文（简体）(Chinese (Simplified))
先驱, 序幕, 前奏, 成为...的序幕, 演奏...作为前奏曲, 作为序曲, 奏序曲

中文（繁體）(Chinese (Traditional))
n. - 先驅, 序幕, 前奏
v. tr. - 成為...的序幕, 演奏...作為前奏曲
v. intr. - 作為序曲, 奏序曲

한국어 (Korean)
n. - 전주곡
v. tr. - ~의 서곡이 되다
v. intr. - 본론에 앞서 머리말을 하다

日本語 (Japanese)
n. - 前兆, 前触れ, 前奏曲, 序曲, プレリュード, 前奏
v. - 前触れとなる, 前置きとする, 前奏曲を演奏する

العربيه (Arabic)
‏(الاسم) مقدمه, افتتاحيه, استهلال, استهلال لحن‏

עברית (Hebrew)
n. - ‮פתיחה, אקדמה, פרלוד, אירוע או מצב המשמשים כמבוא לשיר, ליצירה מוסיקלית, לאופרה וכו'‬
v. tr. - ‮אקדם‬
v. intr. - ‮היווה הקדמה ל-‬

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