Idiom
sing small
Meaning
To assume a humble tone.
Meaning adapted from Wiktionary, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Examples
“He had to sing small after he made a big mistake.”
“After the manager corrected his errors, he had to sing small during the meeting.”
“The arrogant politician was forced to sing small once the public discovered the truth about his secret financial dealings.”
Examples
simple
“He had to sing small after he made a big mistake.”
contextual
“After the manager corrected his errors, he had to sing small during the meeting.”
complex
“The arrogant politician was forced to sing small once the public discovered the truth about his secret financial dealings.”
Origin
From sing and the obsolete use of small to mean softly or in a low tone. The idiom retains this sense of reduced volume, functioning as a compound of the verb and the adverbial form for a quiet fashion.
Key words
Related idioms
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