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The Learning Kingdom's Cool Word of the Day for April 20, 1999
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tucket [n. TUK-it]
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At a professional sports event, there might be an organist who plays
short, rousing musical fanfares, to help get everybody excited. Each
one of those little blasts of music is called a tucket.
Originally a tucket was a trumpet fanfare, used to announce the
arrival of someone important like a king or queen. The reason for the
fanfare was to give people time to get composed for the royal
audience.
The word is from Middle English tukken (to beat a drum), which was
also the source of Modern English tuck (a tap or beat of a drum). An
earlier ancestor was Old French toquer (to strike), which is from
Vulgar Latin toccare (to touch).
Another word from the same root is toccata [tuh-KAH-tuh], from
Italian. A toccata is a musical composition, usually for the
keyboard, in a free style with full chords and elaborate runs.
There's also tocsin [TOK-sin], which is an alarm that is rung on a
bell, or a more general warning or omen.
Bach's Toccata and Fugue, possibly the most famous organ work of all
time:
http://www.futurenet.com/classicalnet/reference/works/b/bachjs-toccandfug.html
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