The word staccato is mostly used in reference to music and it allows musicians to understand that a piece of music has pauses between notes and short blasts of sound that usually are disconnected one from the other. This happens in counterpoint to a flowing musical piece, where there are no stops and no disconnected or discordant sudden bursts of sound from a particular instrument. There are many synonyms for the word staccato, but one that can be used as a context clue for the actual word is disconnected. For example: this music piece is filled with staccato. There is disconnection between the sounds of the guitars and piano in the piece.