tonal

adjective

No English definition recorded for this entry.

Pronunciation: /ˈtoʊnəl/ / /ˈtəʊnəl/

Etymology: From tone + -al.

Of or relating to tones or tonality.
“Songs for the family-table on Sabbaths and holidays—songs which give those various holy days tonal expression and which aim to spiritualize the meals.”
Of or relating to the general character, mood, or trend of something.
“The lurid way the story played out felt like a tonal shift for Empire, but not necessarily a bad one—in the process of shedding its cool costume-drama attitude for grotesque family dysfunction, the episode felt for once less like a story about Prohibition and more one about a specific set of people.”
Employing tones that have a predictable relationship to some tonic.
Employing differences in pitch (tones) to distinguish differences in the meaning of otherwise similar words (words which would otherwise be homophonic).

Etymology: From Nahuatl tōnalli (“day, day sign”).

An animal companion which accompanies a person from birth to death.
“When a tonal suffers misfortune or death, the same thing happens to the person associated with it.”