keening

1. not comparableSharp, shrill, especially of a sound.

   The keening sound of a dentist's drill sets my teeth on edge.

   2 more examples

   When Leo is happy, he bursts out in riffs of scat singing, making up little melodies as he goes. When he’s basically content but feeling restless, he makes a sound like tikka, tikka, tikka. If he’s more anxious than that, he makes a sound like Jimmy Durante: “Atch-cha-cha!” A sudden burst of happiness can inspire Leo to whirl his arms around and gallop in circles shouting, “Whoop! Whoop! Whoop!” When he’s tired, he makes a soft keening noise. And when Leo is hungry, he just sobs his heart out.

   2015, Steve Silberman, chapter 2, in Megan Newman, editor, NeuroTribes: The Legacy of Autism and the Future of Neurodiversity, New York: Avery, →ISBN, page 46

   As Black Sabbath’s doomsayer-in-chief, Osbourne could summon a true sense of terror in his keening cries in a way that heightened the band’s muscular dirges.

   2025 July 22, Kory Grow, “Ozzy Osbourne obituary: The Godfather of Heavy Metal who changed the world”, in Rolling Stone

plural keenings

1. countableuncountableIntense mournful wailing after a death, often at a funeral or wake.

   Keening. I remember keening that seemed to go on all through the night: shrill, sharp, shiny, needles of sound piercing cleanly and deeply to let the anguish in, not out.

   1988, Tsitsi Dangarembga, Nervous Conditions, Faber & Faber Limited (2021), page 85

2. broadlycountableuncountableAn unpleasant wailing sound.

1. gerundparticiplepresentpresent participle and gerund of keen