strike a false note

present singular third person strikes a false note · participle present striking a false note · participle past struck a false note · past struck a false note

1. idiomaticTo give the impression of being insincere, incongruous or inappropriate.

   But she crossed out “I do understand”; it struck a false note. Henry could not bear to be understood.

   1910, E. M. Forster, chapter 28, in Howards End, New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, page 293

   2 more examples

   He dressed in a mannered fashion with turned-back cuffs and double slits to his coat, bow-ties and fancy waistcoats. He made a good-living, wine-and-food-society impression in which only the slow, rather cunning blue eyes struck a false note.

   1960, Ian Fleming, “From a View To a Kill”, in For Your Eyes Only, London: Jonathan Cape

   He knew what stories to whisper and when not to tell stories at all and knew, too, when the business was over, never to make reference to what had been said. ¶ Put simply this was a man who had learned never to strike a false note.

   2000, Alan Bennett, “The Laying On of Hands”, in The Laying On of Hands: Stories, New York: Picador, published 2002, page 71

   Synonyms: hit a false note