"somber undertone" is a correct and commonly used phrase in written English.
It refers to a subtle feeling or atmosphere of sadness, seriousness, or gravity in a sentence or situation. Example: The comedian's jokes had a somber undertone, hinting at the recent tragedy that had occurred in the town.
But there has been a somber undertone.
The mood was buoyant, punctuated by eruptions of applause and cheers, a stark contrast to the "somber undertone," as Dr. Miron described it, of a week earlier at a school where an entry-foyer display proudly highlights the title bestowed recently by New Jersey Monthly magazine: the best public high school in the state.
But with the encores, Mr. Kuti also revealed a clear difference between his father's songs, which always held a somber undertone, and his own, which make room for open celebration -- the chance to enjoy life during, and perhaps after, the struggle.
"Even in songs of rejoicing, her voice has a somber undertone," Jon Pareles wrote in The New York Times in 1990, "and when she takes on supplicating songs like the midtempo 'Lord I've Tried' or the glacial minor-key blues of 'Stand by Me' — both of which rise, verse by verse, to a near-scream — Ms. Andrews can sound desperate, on the verge of hysteria.
The evening had somber undertones, as many award recipients and presenters offered their thoughts to Gary Carter, the former Met who was found to have brain cancer last year.
Roosevelt understood that despite all the food, football and shopping -- already holiday mainstays -- Thanksgiving is a more complex celebration with somber undertones, its central narrative one of confronting and triumphing, sometimes just barely, over adversity.
Despite its somber undertones, Can't You See also has its happier moments.
Dubus's plain-spoken prose has an undertone of Yankee wryness; the somber, autumnal quiet that governs his stories is broken, at crucial moments, by a crackle of laughter at the dogged ridiculousness that attends even moments of great distress.
