alamiren.
/eɪlɑːˈmiːreɪ/, U.S. /eɪlɑˈmireɪ/ Music. Now historical and rare.
In the system attributed to Guido d'Arezzo (see gamut n. 2a): the note A in any hexachord except the lowest, corresponding to a or a′ in Helmholtz's notation, and sung to the syllables la, mi, or re; = A mi la n. Cf. a re n.1
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society > leisure > the arts > music > musical sound > pitch > system of sounds or intervals > [noun] > hexachord > notes of hexachords
cesolfaa1325
G-sol-re-utc1325
lac1325
solc1325
utc1325
effautc1380
alamirea1450
mia1450
rea1450
e-la-mic1550
A mi la1696
a1450 L. Power Treat. on Counterpoint in Speculum (1935) 10 248 (MED) Alamire haþe 7 acordis.
a1529 J. Skelton Colyn Cloute (?1545) sig. A.iv And sol fa, so a lamyre.
?1596 W. Bathe Briefe Introd. Skill of Song To Rdr. sig. A.ijv Then must he know b,..whereby mi, in Alamire.
1609 J. Dowland tr. A. Ornithoparchus Micrologus i. xi. 27 The Keyes..be the Letters which end irregular Songs..viz. alamire [L. alamire] wherein ends euery song of the First and Second transposed Tone.
1654 E. Gayton Pleasant Notes Don Quixot iii. iii. 83 She run through all the keyes from A-la-mi-re to double Gammut.
1705 T. Salmon in Philos. Trans. 1705–5 (Royal Soc.) 24 2080 An Octave, from Are to Alamire.
1761 F. H. E. Stiles in Philos. Trans. 1760 (Royal Soc.) 51 699 Our natural scale, beginning with Are, and ending with Alamire.
2005 J. Harley William Byrd's Modal Pract. iii. 28 The key name depended on the note that the bass ended upon, so the key of A might be ‘Are’ (A), or ‘Alamire’ (a).
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, September 2012; most recently modified version published online December 2021).
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n.a1450