Prom the open window wafted the gentle strains of a lute accompanying a well-trained tenor voice.

When the dust cleared, what emerged as "folk" was a gentle strain of pop.

If they're seeking Penelope and the gentle strain of a lute, however, they'll be sorely disappointed.

There was conversation and laughter, but the gentle strains of the three harpists in the corner could still be heard.

Yet it was a kind of lust he had never known before-lust with an oddly gentle strain.

In her gloom she played a sad, gentle strain on a koto.

He interrupted a gentle strain upon a koto.

There was music: the first gentle strains of the Wedding March.

But I'm sure we can combat it, probably through adulteration of the African's fierce swarms with our own gentler domestic strains.

The gentle strains of an old musical composition induced a comforting feeling in me.