choir

See also: chóir

English

Alternative forms

• quire (archaic)

Etymology

From Middle English quer, quere, from Old French quer, from Latin chorus, from . Modern spelling influenced by chorus and Modern French chœur. Doublet of chorus.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /kwaɪə(ɹ)/

• Audio (UK):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -aɪə(r)
• IPA^(key): /kwaɪɚ/

• Audio (US):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -aɪɚ
• Homophone: quire

Noun

choir (plural choirs)

1. Singing group; group of people who sing together; company of people who are trained to sing together.
   • 1918, W. B. Maxwell, chapter 5, in The Mirror and the Lamp:

     Then everybody once more knelt, and soon the blessing was pronounced. The choir and the clergy trooped out slowly, […], down the nave to the western door. […] At a seemingly immense distance the surpliced group stopped to say the last prayer.

   The church choir practices Thursday nights.

2. (architecture) The part of a church where the choir assembles for song.
   • 1918, W. B. Maxwell, chapter 5, in The Mirror and the Lamp:

     Here, in the transept and choir, where the service was being held, one was conscious every moment of an increasing brightness; colours glowing vividly beneath the circular chandeliers, and the rows of small lights on the choristers' desks flashed and sparkled in front of the boys' faces, deep linen collars, and red neckbands.

3. (Christian angelology) One of the nine ranks or orders of angels.

   Seraphim, Cherubim, and Thrones are three of the choirs of angels.

4. Set of strings (one per note) for a harpsichord.

Derived terms

• chorister
• Nikon choir

Related terms

• choral
• chorus
• quire

Translations

singing group

• Afrikaans: koor n
• Arabic: كُورَال m (kōrāl), جَوْقَة f (jawqa)

  Egyptian Arabic: كورال m (korāl)

• Basque: abesbatza, koru
• Belarusian: хор m (xor)
• Bulgarian: хор m (hor)
• Catalan: cor (ca) m
• Chinese:

  Cantonese: 合唱團／合唱团 (hap⁶ coeng³ tyun⁴), 合唱团 (hap⁶ coeng³ tyun⁴)

  Mandarin: 合唱團／合唱团 (zh) (héchàngtuán), 合唱团 (zh) (héchàngtuán), 唱詩班／唱诗班 (zh) (chàngshībān), 唱诗班 (zh) (chàngshībān)

• Czech: sbor (cs) m, chór m
• Danish: kor (da) n
• Dutch: koor (nl) n
• Esperanto: ĥoro (eo)
• Estonian: koor (et)
• Faroese: kór n
• Finnish: kuoro (fi), kööri (fi) (colloquial)
• French: chœur (fr) m
• Galician: coro (gl) m
• German: Chor (de) m
• Greek: χορωδία (el) f (chorodía)
• Hebrew: מקהלה (he) f (maqhela)
• Hindi: कोरस (hi) (koras)
• Hungarian: kórus (hu), énekkar (hu), kar (hu)
• Icelandic: kór (is) m
• Ido: koro (io)
• Interlingue:
• Irish: cór m
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}
• Italian: coro (it) m
• Japanese: 合唱団 (がっしょうだん, gasshōdan)
• Korean: 합창단 (hapchangdan) (合唱團)
• Latin: chorus m
• Luhya: ekwaya
• Maori: koaea, koea, rōpū waiata, tira waiata, kapa waiata
• Ngarrindjeri: kykulan
• Norwegian: kor (no) n
• Old English: chor m
• Polish: chór (pl) m inan
• Portuguese: coro (pt) m, coral (pt) m
• Romanian: cor (ro)
• Russian: хор (ru) m (xor)
• Scottish Gaelic: còisir f
• Serbo-Croatian:

  Cyrillic: хор m

  Roman: hor (sh) m

• Slovak: chór m, zbor m
• Slovene: zbor (sl) m, kor m
• Spanish: coro (es) m
• Swahili: kwaya (sw)
• Swedish: kör (sv) c
• Thai: คายกคณะ (kaa-yá-gà-ká-ná), ลูกคู่ (lûuk-kûu), นักร้องหมู่ (nák-rɔ́ɔng-mùu), คณะนักร้องประสานเสียง, คณะประสานเสียง (ká-ná-bprà-sǎan-sǐiang)
• Turkish: koro (tr)
• Ukrainian: хор m (xor)
• Vietnamese: dàn hợp xướng (團合唱)
• Welsh: côr

part of a church for choir assembly

• Armenian: դաս (hy) (das)
• Basque: koru
• Bulgarian: хор m (hor)
• Czech: kruchta (cs) f, kůr (cs) m
• Dutch: koor (nl) n
• Finnish: kuori (fi)
• French: chœur (fr)
• German: Chor (de) m
• Greek: χορωδία (el) f (chorodía)
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}
• Hungarian: kórus (hu), énekkar (hu), kar (hu)
• Icelandic: kór (is) m
• Indonesian: kor (id)
• Italian: coro (it) m
• Japanese: 聖歌隊 (せいかたい, seikatai)
• Norwegian: kor (no) c
• Polish: chór (pl) m inan
• Portuguese: coro (pt) m
• Russian: хоры́ (ru) m pl (xorý)
• Swedish: kor (sv) c

a rank or order of angels

• French: classe (fr), chœur (fr)
• German: Engelschor m
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}
• Polish: chór (pl) m inan

Verb

choir (third-person singular simple present choirs, present participle choiring, simple past and past participle choired)

1. Alternative form of quire (“to sing in concert”)
   • 1859, The Presbyterian Magazine (volume 9, page 423)

     The great aim of this book is to secure congregational singing, which the churches must come to, at last, after a long interval of choiring.

Anagrams

• chiro, chiro-, ichor

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French

Etymology

From Middle French cheoir, from Old French cheoir, from Vulgar Latin *cadēre, from Latin cadere, present active infinitive of cadō, from Proto-Italic *kadō, from Proto-Indo-European *ḱh₂d- (“to fall”). Compare Franco-Provençal chêre, Occitan caire, Catalan caure, Italian cadere, Spanish caer.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ʃwaʁ/
• Rhymes: -waʁ

Verb

choir (defective) (past participle chu)

1. (literary) to fall

Conjugation

This is a defective verb, only conjugated in certain tenses.

Conjugation of choir (see also Appendix:French verbs)

infinitive	simple	choir
	compound	avoir + past participle
present participle or gerund1	simple	—
	compound	ayant + past participle
past participle		chu /ʃy/
		singular			plural
		first	second	third	first	second	third
indicative		je (j’)	tu	il, elle, on	nous	vous	ils, elles
(simple tenses)	present	chois /ʃwa/	chois /ʃwa/	choit /ʃwa/	choyons /ʃwa.jɔ̃/	choyez /ʃwa.je/	choient /ʃwa/
	imperfect	—	—	—	—	—	—
	past historic2	chus /ʃy/	chus /ʃy/	chut /ʃy/	chûmes /ʃym/	chûtes /ʃyt/	churent /ʃyʁ/
	future	choirai or cherrai /ʃwa.ʁe/ or /ʃɛ.ʁe/ or /ʃe.ʁe/	choiras or cherras /ʃwa.ʁa/ or /ʃɛ.ʁa/ or /ʃe.ʁa/	choira or cherra /ʃwa.ʁa/ or /ʃɛ.ʁa/ or /ʃe.ʁa/	choirons or cherrons /ʃwa.ʁɔ̃/ or /ʃɛ.ʁɔ̃/ or /ʃe.ʁɔ̃/	choirez or cherrez /ʃwa.ʁe/ or /ʃɛ.ʁe/ or /ʃe.ʁe/	choiront or cherront /ʃwa.ʁɔ̃/ or /ʃɛ.ʁɔ̃/ or /ʃe.ʁɔ̃/
	conditional	choirais /ʃwaʁɛ/	choirais /ʃwaʁɛ/	choirait /ʃwaʁɛ/	choirions /ʃwaʁjɔ̃/	choiriez /ʃwaʁje/	choiraient /ʃwaʁɛ/
(compound tenses)	present perfect	present indicative of avoir + past participle
	pluperfect	imperfect indicative of avoir + past participle
	past anterior2	past historic of avoir + past participle
	future perfect	future of avoir + past participle
	conditional perfect	conditional of avoir + past participle
subjunctive		que je (j’)	que tu	qu’il, qu’elle	que nous	que vous	qu’ils, qu’elles
(simple tenses)	present	—	—	—	—	—	—
	imperfect2	—	—	chût /ʃy/	—	—	—
(compound tenses)	past	present subjunctive of avoir + past participle
	pluperfect2	imperfect subjunctive of avoir + past participle
imperative		–	tu	–	nous	vous	–
simple		—	—	—	—	—	—
compound		—	simple imperative of avoir + past participle	—	simple imperative of avoir + past participle	simple imperative of avoir + past participle	—
1 The French gerund is usable only with the preposition en.
2 In less formal writing or speech, these tenses may be found to have been replaced in the following way: past historic → present perfect past anterior → pluperfect imperfect subjunctive → present subjunctive pluperfect subjunctive → past subjunctive (Christopher Kendris [1995], Master the Basics: French, pp. 77, 78, 79, 81).

Synonyms

• tomber

Derived terms

• chute
• déchoir
• échoir
• méchoir
• rechoir

Further reading

• “choir”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

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Irish

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): [xɛɾʲ]

Noun

choir m

1. Lenited form of coir.