[It. = strong, loud:—L. fortis.] A. adj. (adv.) A musical direction indicating a strong, loud tone in performance. Also forte forte very loud. (Abbreviated f., ff.) Also attrib.
1714. Short Explic. For. Words in Mus. Bks., 32. Forte … is to play or sing loud and strong, and Forte Forte, or FF, is very loud.
1818. in Todd.
1852. Spencer, Use & Beauty, Ess. 1891, II. 373. Forte passages in music must have piano passages to relieve them.
1884. Pall Mall G., 8 Sept., 4/2. The usual jubilant and unsuitable forte chorus.
B. sb. ‘Forte’ tone; a ‘forte’ passage. Also, in the Harmonium, an apparatus used for producing a forte effect.
1759. Sterne, Tr. Shandy, I. xxiii. 169. I am not ignorant that the Italians pretend to a mathematical exactness in their designations of one particular sort of character among them, from the forte or piano of a certain wind instrument they use,—which they say is infallible.
a. 1774. Fergusson, Poems (1845), 5.
| But banish vile Italian tricks | |
| Frae out your quorum | |
| Nor fortes wi’ pianos mix, | |
| Gie’s Tullochgorum. |
1883. Athenæum, 28 April, 549/3. His tone in the fortes is rather coarse.
