meter
n. C / Un. the regular beat or pattern of sounds in a piece of music or a poem. It helps you feel the rhythm and know when to clap or emphasize a word.
n. the basic rhythmic structure of a verse or lines in verse, or the systematic arrangement of musical pulses into recurring patterns of strong and weak beats.
The song has a fast meter that makes people want to dance.
The poet used a strict iambic meter to give the verses a steady, heartbeat-like rhythm.
While the melody remains fluid, the underlying meter provides a structural framework that prevents the orchestral performance from descending into rhythmic chaos during the more complex passages.
From Middle English metere (“one who measures, measurer”), perhaps (with change in suffix) from Old English metend (“one who measures or metes”), equivalent to mete (“to measure”) + -er. The transference from "person who measures" to "device that measures" was probably assisted by association with -meter, as in barometer, etc. Cognate with Scots mettar, metter (“meter, measurer”), Saterland Frisian Meter, Meeter (“measurer, measuring device, gauge”), West Frisian mjitter (“measurer”), Dutch meter (“measurer, gauge”), German Low German Meter (“measuring device, gauge”), German Messer (“measurer, measuring device, gauge”), Swedish mätare (“measurer”).
Borrowed from French mètre, itself borrowed from Latin metrum, borrowed from Ancient Greek μέτρον (métron).
From Middle English meter, metre, from Old English meter and Old French metre; both from Latin metrum, from Ancient Greek μέτρον (métron).
Uncountable when referring to the general concept of rhythmic structure; countable when referring to a specific type of pattern (e.g., 'a triple meter').