percussionist
"percussionist" is a 13-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“percussionist” is uncommon English (frequency #56,356 among 4,417 “P” headwords), classed as a noun. The kind of spelling people second-guess.
- #56,356
- frequency rank, English
- 4,417
- “P” headwords
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed September 3, 2026) - A trained musician who plays percussion instruments, as opposed to a drummer who lacks formal training.
Corpus desk
Index EN-percussionist · percussionist · English
percussionist · rank #56,356 · 0 variants · 0 confusables
- FREQ-RARE #56,356
- LEN-MEGA 13 letters
- VOW-5 5 vowels
- CONFUS-0 No pairs
- VAR-0 0 variants
- BOOK-MID 4,417
- PHOTO-FINISH Perce
Nearest frequency peer: Perce (-1 rank slots)
Read with this headword: Spelling guide for this pattern
Desk codes from Wiktionary headword shape, FrequencyWords rank tier, confusable-pair count, generated misspelling depth, letter-cohort book size, and photo-finish peer. Not a difficulty grade.
Long-tail ranks near “percussionist”
Sparse band: bars invert rank so rarer forms read shorter
- pav
pav
43,649 corpus weight
- penmanship
penmanship
43,648 corpus weight
- perc
perc
43,647 corpus weight
- Perce
Perce
43,646 corpus weight
- percussioni…
percussionist
43,645 corpus weight
- perfunctory
perfunctory
43,644 corpus weight
What this shows Long-tail view: where “percussionist” sits against similarly uncommon English ranks.
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | percussionist |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| Letters | 13 |
| Frequency rank | #56,356 |
| Misspellings tracked | 0 |
| Confusable pairs | 0 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Long-tail rank of “percussionist” in English
Rare enough to double-check
percussionist is uncommon English at frequency #56,356 among 4,417 “P” headwords, classed as anoun. Rarity is why readers land here mid-draft. Gloss: "A trained musician who plays percussion instruments, as opposed to a drummer who lacks formal training.".
Zero misspellings are on record for percussionist in our index, a sign its spelling follows regular English conventions. We don't track a confusable pairing for this entry, which typically means the spelling is too distinctive to be mistaken for another word.
Etymologically, the entry records: From percussion + -ist. The correct English form is percussionist, spelled P-E-R-C-U-S-S-I-O-N-I-S-T.
Definition
- 1A trained musician who plays percussion instruments, as opposed to a drummer who lacks formal training.
Recorded use
Wiktionary exampleThese source excerpts show how percussionist appears in context. They illustrate usage; the definition above remains the entry’s reference meaning.
Since the 1960s, the keyboardist, vibraphonist and percussionist Mulatu Astatke has been a prime mover in Ethio-jazz: unmistakably Ethiopian music that also draws on American jazz, Afro-Caribbean music and more.
Etymology
From percussion + -ist.
This word in other languages
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA); frequency ordering uses the FrequencyWords open word-frequency list (2018 English corpus, MIT). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Similar English words by spelling shape
Same letter count and similar misspelling depth for "percussionist", not the corpus desk frequency band.
Same letter count
Frequency-ranked English headwords with 13 letters (nearest by frequency rank).