Waltz Meaning
/wɒlts/Definition, CEFR level B1, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.
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Definition
nounA ballroom dance in 3/4 time.
nounA piece of music for this dance (or in triple time).
Sentence Examples
She played a waltz on the piano.
Tom asked Mary to teach him how to do the waltz.
CEFR Practice Quiz
At the ballroom, the couple started to ____ elegantly across the floor.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
The couple performed a beautiful ____ during their first dance at the wedding, moving gracefully across the floor today.
Word Origin & History
From German Walzer, from walzen (“to dance”), from Old High German walzan (“to turn”), from Proto-Germanic *walt- (“to turn”), from Proto-Indo-European *welH- (“to turn”). Doublet of valse. More at *waltaną.
Literary Quotations & Historical Citations
"Miss Esler and Mr. McMorrow went to Kalgoorlie to adjudicate at the goldfields waltz and quickstep championships, and found the standard of dancing surprisingly high."
— 1938 October 26, The Daily News, Perth, page 11, column 5:
""Can you flamenco?" "If I have to. How about you?" "Love, I can barely waltz. Jive a bit if I'm pissed enough.""
— 2010, Peter Corris, Torn Apart, Allen and Unwin, page 212:
"Oxlade-Chamberlain, 18, became the youngest English Champions League scorer when he waltzed across the area to plant a low shot into the corner."
— 2011 September 28, Tom Rostance, “Arsenal 2 - 1 Olympiakos”, in BBC Sport:
"The women in Ms. Telfer’s book waltz right by societal rules that would leave the rest of us at a standstill. We are left tsk-tsking, while also in awe."
— 2021 February 25, Mara Altman, “Glitzy, Tragic and Selfish: Female Con Artists Waltz by Society’s Rules”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:
"And he said, what he had planned in his head from the start, if we got Jim out all safe, was for us to[…] take him back up home on a steamboat, in style, and pay him for his lost time, and write word ahead and get out all the niggers around, and have them waltz him into town with a torchlight procession and a brass-band, and then he would be a hero, and so would we."
— 1884 December 10, Mark Twain [pseudonym; Samuel Langhorne Clemens], “Chapter the last”, in The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn: (Tom Sawyer’s Comrade) […], London: Chatto & Windus, […], →OCLC:
Explore More B1 Vocabulary Words
CEFR Practice Quiz
At the ballroom, the couple started to ____ elegantly across the floor.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
The couple performed a beautiful ____ during their first dance at the wedding, moving gracefully across the floor today.