Remastered

How to spell remastered

10 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce remastered

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does remastered mean?

1. verbProduced a new, improved master recording from older audio or video source material.
2. adjectiveDescribing a recording reissued from a freshly improved master, with cleaner or sharper quality.

Remastered in a sentence

• verb

  The engineers remastered the original tapes for the anniversary release.

• adjective

  The remastered edition of the album sounds noticeably clearer than the original.

• verb

  The studio remastered every track using the restored session files.

• adjective

  Fans queued to buy the remastered version of the classic film on disc.

Where does remastered come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word is built on 'master', which travelled into English from the Latin magister, meaning 'chief', 'director', or 'teacher', the title of someone who held a position of greater authority. Latin magister passed into Old English as mægister and was reinforced later by the Old French maistre, giving the noun and verb 'master' that English has used for over a thousand years. The verb sense relevant here, 'to produce the definitive recording from which copies are made', grew out of the audio industry in the twentieth century, where the original 'master' tape or disc was the authoritative source. Adding the Latin-derived prefix re-, meaning 'again' or 'back', produced 'remaster': to make a fresh, improved master from older source material. The -ed ending then gives both the past tense and the adjective, and the spelling stays simple because each piece (re + master + ed) is added cleanly with no doubled letters.

How the word is built

• re- (again)
• master (to gain control of, from Latin magister: chief, teacher)
• -ed (past tense / adjective suffix)