Violinist

How to spell violinist

9 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce violinist

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does violinist mean?

1. nounA person who plays the violin, especially as a profession or serious pursuit.

Violinist in a sentence

• The orchestra hired a new lead violinist for the season.

• As a teenager she practised four hours a day to become a concert violinist.

Where does violinist come from?

Language of origin: Italian

This word is built from 'violin' plus the agent suffix '-ist', which English borrowed from Greek by way of Latin and French to mark a person who does or plays something. The instrument name 'violin' came into English in the late 1500s from the Italian violino, a diminutive meaning 'little viola'; viola itself traces back to a Romance root for stringed instruments, ultimately linked to the medieval Latin vitula. So a violinist is literally 'one of the little viola', a player of the smaller, higher-pitched member of the bowed string family. The same '-ist' suffix that turns piano into pianist and cello into cellist does the work here, which is why the spelling simply stacks 'violin' and 'ist' with a single 'l' throughout. The single 'l' in violin (not 'violl') is the usual stumbling point, since the word looks as though it might double.

How the word is built

• violin (the instrument, from Italian violino)
• -ist (one who plays or practises)