a. (adv.) and sb. [It.; see FORTE and PIANO.]
A. adj. (adv.) A musical direction indicating sudden but transient emphasis; loud, then immediately soft. (Abbreviated fp.)
† B. sb. The original name of the PIANOFORTE.
1769. Publ. Advertiser, 24 May, 4/3. A very large Forte ex [read e or et] Piano in a Harpsichord Carcase.
1771. T. Jefferson, Lett., Writ. 1802, I. 395. I have since seen a Forte-piano and am charmed with it.
1824. Dict. Musicians, s.v. Bach.… The king then gave up his concert for that evening, and invited Bach to try his forte-pianos made by Silvermann, which stood in several rooms of the palace.
1879–80. Grove, Dict. Mus., I. 556. Fortepiano—afterwards changed to pianoforte—was the natural Italian name for the new instrument which could give both loud and soft sounds, instead of loud only, as was the case with the harpsichord.
b. attrib., as forte-piano maker, teacher.
1840. Marryat, Poor Jack, xiii. He had a knack of twisting and moving his fingers about as he walked the deck; and the men were wont to say that ‘he must have been a forty piany teacher.’
1844. J. W. Croker, Guillotine (1853), 47. An officer of the criminal court at Strasburgh, named Laquiante, had made a design of a machine à décapiter, and employed one Schmidt, a forte-piano maker, to execute it.
