prelude

The Lilliputian people in the foreground look excited—or is it terrified?—and the heavy mood feels less like a romantic outing than a prelude to volcanic eruption.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 24, 2026

A 2023 victory over Troy Williamson should have been Agyarko's springboard to bigger fights but it proved little more than a prelude to a frustrating 12 months with just one low-key outing.

From BBC ● Jul. 22, 2026

At Ojai, Lewis wistfully performed the solo prelude off in Libbey Park shrubbery as if a dallying forest spirit summoning ghosts of festivals past.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 23, 2026

Yet while an increase in wholesale prices is a prelude of sorts to what consumers end up paying for goods and services, the relationship is far from exact.

From MarketWatch ● May 13, 2026

If the music Bod had heard until then was a prelude, it was a prelude no longer.

From "The Graveyard Book" by Neil Gaiman

He started playing piano at the age of two and, at just 17, gave a remarkable two-and-a-half-hour concert featuring the 24 preludes and fugues by composer Dmitri Shostakovich.

From BBC ● Aug. 24, 2024

The novenario meals were preludes to the funeral reception, held at Torres Banquet Hall near St. Alphonsus.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 11, 2023

He plays a pair of pieces from Muzio Clementi’s “Gradus” collection, and flanks the Debussy with little-played, moodily lyrical Beethoven preludes.

From New York Times ● Apr. 27, 2023

It hosted world gymnastics and track titles, both of which were preludes to the World Cup, which is costing the country an estimated $220 billion.

From Seattle Times ● Nov. 16, 2022

The twelve-note octave as we know it became a firm fixture of Western music after the publication in 1722 of J. S. Bach’s forty-eight preludes and fugues for the 'Well-Tempered Keyboard’.

From "The Story of Music" by Howard Goodall

The Taliban did not issue a formal statement on the anniversary of the al-Qaeda terrorist attacks that preluded them being driven from power 20 years earlier.

From Washington Post ● Sep. 11, 2021

Similar marches have since preluded Pride events across the country.

From Washington Times ● Jun. 6, 2019

Seventy years later, it was lost to the modern urges that preluded the Seattle Century 21 World’s Fair.

From Seattle Times ● Nov. 22, 2018

Last week came a Luther Day which was notable because it preluded bigger celebrations, to be held Nov. 10 on the 450th anniversary of Martin Luther's birth.

From Time Magazine Archive

Miss Pratt cleared her throat in the ominous manner that always preluded trouble.

From Loyal to the School by Brazil, Angela

They were preluding a Pan-Pacific Buddhists' Conference to be held in Tokyo in 1934.

From Time Magazine Archive

"Too bad about old Wiggy," he remarked with his preluding sigh.

From The Siege of the Seven Suitors by Nicholson, Meredith

Again atmosphere is evoked and the mood achieved by the lyre preluding of the poet.

From Franz Liszt by Huneker, James

Beethoven said to me, "I thought Himmel had just been preluding."

From Life of Beethoven by Schindler, Anton

Sometimes Kirkwood without preluding, would utter a line for Phil to cap; they even composed sonnets in this antiphonal fashion and pronounced them superior to the average magazine product.

From Otherwise Phyllis by Gibson, Charles Dana