Word.ws English Dictionary

haute-contre

haute-contre noun: the highest of the male modal voices (i.e. not a countertenor); it is lower than the female contralto and higher than the tenor. Only specified as a seperate voice part in French Baroque repertoire.

Noun

haute-contre (plural hautes-contre)

  1. (baroque music jargon) The highest of the male modal voices (i.e. not a countertenor); it is lower than the female contralto and higher than the tenor. Only specified as a seperate voice part in French Baroque repertoire.

Forms of haute-contre

pluralhautes-contre

Origin of haute-contre

From French haute-contre.

Questions about haute-contre

What does haute-contre mean?
Haute-contre means the highest of the male modal voices (i.e. not a countertenor); it is lower than the female contralto and higher than the tenor. Only specified as a seperate voice part in French Baroque repertoire.
What part of speech is haute-contre?
Haute-contre is a noun.
What is the plural of haute-contre?
The plural of haute-contre is hautes-contre.

Words near haute-contre in the dictionary

  1. haute cuisine
  2. haute culture
  3. haute ecole
  4. haute piece
  5. haute pieces
  6. haute-contre
  7. Haute-Corse
  8. Haute-Garonne
  9. Haute-Loire
  10. Haute-Marne
  11. haute-piece

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: haute-contre (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “haute-contre.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/haute-contre. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.