crooner
(ˈkruːnə(r))
[f. croon v. + -er.]
a. One who croons. In Sc. a name for a fish, the Grey Gurnard (Trigla gurnardus), from the noise it makes when landed.
| 1808 in Jamieson. 1838 Proc. Berw. Nat. Club I. 170 Trigla gurnardus..the Gurnett or Crooner. 1884 G. H. Boughton in Harper's Mag. Dec. 73/1 We..discovered each other—the crooner and I. |
b. spec. A singer who croons (see croon v. 2 a).
| 1930 Vanity Fair July 57 Just call them Crooners. 1932 Thorne Smith Bishop's Jaegers (1934) 314 That sound..is made nightly by one of the nation's most popular crooners. 1933 [see croon v. 2 a]. 1948 Penguin Music Mag. Feb. 25 The B.B.C. could start the campaign by refusing to make ‘stars’ of its crooners. 1954 Granta 6 Nov. 23/1 Dickie Valentine turns out, from his old cuttings, to be a crooner, as I had suspected. |