croon

verb

1. (transitive)To hum or sing (a song or tune), or to speak (words), softly in a low pitch or in a sentimental manner; specifically, to sing (a popular song) in a low, mellow voice.

   “He was crooning a song.”

   “Tam ſkelpit on thro' dub and mire, / Deſpiſing vvind, and rain, and fire; / VVhiles holding faſt his gude blue bonnet; / VVhiles crooning o'er ſome auld Scots ſonnet; […]”

   “So they went, toiling up [the staircase]; she singing all the way, and Paul sometimes crooning out a feeble accompaniment.”

   “[A]ny other woman would have been melted to marrow at hearing such stanzas crooned in her praise.”

   “Thou croonest thy wild death-song o'er the world; / Serene Futurity thou dost conceal; / Thy banner is the shroud, the pall unfurled / Above mankind; […]”

2. (transitive)To soothe (a person or an animal) by singing softly.

   “[I]n his ill-remembered prayer, and in the fragment of the childish hymn with which he sung and crooned himself asleep, there breathed as true a spirit as ever studied homily expressed, or old cathedral arches echoed.”

   ““But, you know, crooners gonna croon.””

3. (intransitive)To hum or sing, or to speak, softly in a low pitch or in a sentimental manner; specifically, to sing a popular song in a low, mellow voice.

   “She was crooning, but I couldn’t make out what the song was.”

   “But hark! the robin takes up the strain. […] Thou art a type of the true poet, even of him who "crooneth to himsel" amid poverty, and want, and toil. Other birds require the sunshine and the flower to wake their musical utterances, but the drifting flake and the arrowy hail stay not thy song.”

   “"You, my sweet boy," she croons. "How much you still owe me?" […] "Be happy I ain't charging interest like how the man and all his bug-a-boos do," she croons on. "Just gimme a twenty. You got a dub or not?"”

4. (Northern-England, Scotland, intransitive)To lament, to moan.
5. (Northern-England, Scotland, intransitive)To make a continuous hollow low-pitched moan, as of cattle; to bellow, to low.

   “Novv Clinkumbell, vvi' rattlin tovv, / Begins to jovv an' croon; […]”

   “Even the dull cattle crooned and gazed, / And murmured and looked with anxious pain / For something the mystery to explain.”

   “'Thou hear'st that lordly Bull of mine, / Neighbour,' quoth Brunskill then; / 'How loudly to the hills he crunes, / That crune to him again.[']”

   “Above the marge of night a star still shines, / And on the frosty hills the sombre pines / Harbor an eerie wind that crooneth low / Over the glimmering wastes of virgin snow.”

6. (Northern-England, Scotland, intransitive)Of a large bell: to make a low-pitched sound.

noun

1. A soft, low-pitched sound; specifically, a soft or sentimental hum, song, or tune.

   “O, a’ ye Bards on bonie Doon! / An’ vvha on Ayr your chanters tune! / Come, join the melancholious croon / O’ Robin’s reed! / His heart vvill never get aboon! / His Mailie’s dead!”

   “Bitterly she cried as she thought over the old hag's croon:— / "Quick joy, long pain, / You will take your gift again."”

   “From away out in the darkness came a haunting croon from the lubras and children.”

   “And really, Michael Jackson is a more fitting aspiration for the similarly sexless would-be-former teen heartthrob, who’s compared himself to the late King Of Pop (perhaps a bit prematurely) on several occasions and sings in a Jackson-like croon over a sample of “We’ve Got A Good Thing Going” on Believe’s “Die In Your Arms.””

2. (Northern-England, Scotland)A continuous hollow low-pitched moan, as of cattle; a bellow.

   “Amang the brachens, on the brae, / Betvveen her an' the moon, / The Deil, or elſe an outler Quey, / Gat up an' gae a croon: […]”

   “The bittern mounts the morning air; / And rings the sky with quavering croon; […]”

3. (Northern-England, Scotland)The low-pitched sound of a large bell.