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Crescendo

(pronounced kruh-shen-doh)  verb

Definition

(as noun) 1. a gradual increase in loudness (as in a musical passage). 2. a steady increase in intensity, force, volume, etc. 3. the climactic point in such a progressive increase; peak or climax.

Main Example

• There is a good possibility that Republicans might win control of the U.S. Senate in the upcoming midterm elections. So, if you live in any of the states where a Democratic senator is up for reelection and considered vulnerable, expect to see an intense media blitz in late October and early November, as election campaigns reach their crescendos.

Workplace Examples

• We’re pleased to report that customer satisfaction has risen markedly in recent months, and that product returns are but a fraction of what they were this time last year, when we had a crescendo of customer complaints.
• I too have noticed an unusual amount of goofing off on Friday afternoons, but I don’t plan on taking any action right away because it may well be a temporary phenomenon, one that will peter out on its own. But yes, if it crescendoes...if it becomes more pronounced, I’ll definitely take it up with employee supervisors.

Other Examples

• during a recent speech, this author saying: “I expect that the craze for very large SUVs, which crescendoed during the past couple of decades, will now go steadily downhill as it begins to sink in among all Americans that the ethical thing, the responsible thing, for each of us to do is to reduce our carbon emissions.”
• discussing the then up-trend in interest rates, an analyst saying: “I believe it’s still early in the crescendo and they’ll rise a lot more before reaching the inflection point.”
• criticism of Mohamed Morsi’s presidency--criticism which began crescendoing just a few months after he became Mubarak’s successor--culminating in his ouster by the military
• talk that Israel was about to attack Iran reaching a crescendo in 2012 when, during a speech at the U.N., Prime Minister Netanyahu made sensational claims about how close Tehran was to building a nuclear bomb
• thanks to fugitive Edward Snowden’s revelations about the kind of information being collected by the NSA, the last few months witnessing a crescendo in Americans demanding a sharp diminution in government surveillance of their emails and phone conversations

© 2014 V.J. Singal
No part of this may be reproduced in any form without written permission of the author.