noun, plural har·mo·nies.
- agreement; accord; harmonious relations.
- a consistent, orderly, or pleasing arrangement of parts; congruity.
- Music.
- any simultaneous combination of tones.
- the simultaneous combination of tones, especially when blended into chords pleasing to the ear; chordal structure, as distinguished from melody and rhythm.
- the science of the structure, relations, and practical combination of chords.
- an arrangement of the contents of the Gospels, either of all four or of the first three, designed to show their parallelism, mutual relations, and differences.
noun plural -nies
- agreement in action, opinion, feeling, etc; accord
- order or congruity of parts to their whole or to one another
- agreeable sounds
- music
- any combination of notes sounded simultaneously
- the vertically represented structure of a piece of musicCompare melody (def. 1b), rhythm (def. 1)
- the art or science concerned with the structure and combinations of chords
- a collation of the material of parallel narratives, esp of the four Gospels
late 14c., from Old French armonie “harmony,” also the name of a musical instrument (12c.), from Latin harmonia, from Greek harmonia “agreement, concord of sounds,” also as a proper name, the personification of music, literally “means of joining,” used of ship-planks, etc., also “settled government, order,” related to harmos “fastenings of a door; shoulder,” from PIE *ar-ti-, from *ar- “to fit together” (see arm (n.1)). Musical sense is oldest in English; that of “agreement of feeling, concord” is from late 14c.
The sounding of two or more musical notes at the same time in a way that is pleasant or desired. Harmony, melody, and rhythm are elements of music.