When you’re first starting to learn a musical instrument, the dynamic markings are pretty straightforward.  f stands for forte, Italian for “loud.”  p means piano, or soft.  An m in front of either means mezzo, or medium.  And doubling the letter means “very”:  ff = fortissimo or very loud, pp = pianissimo, very soft.

But if you stick with it, at some point you’ll start coming across unfamiliar markings that you may not know quite how to handle.

That happened to me when I took up the piano again after nearly 30 years of appreciating music rather than playing it.  I felt like I’d stumbled into a bowl of alphabet soup.

I was especially confused by all the variations on forte.  For a while it seemed that every time I turned the page, there was that f hanging out with a different crowd of letters.

Fortunately for me, I am married to a walking music encyclopedia.  I got straightened out pretty quick. 

But for those less fortunate souls who have to fend for themselves, here is a short list of forte-variations you might find cropping up in your scores:

  fff, ffff, etc. Needs no explanation, really.  The more f’s, the louder.  The fun part is say it in Italian.  fff is fortississimo, ffff is fortissississimo, etc.  Don’t forget to wave your arms a lot.  If anyone can figure out how to incorporate this into a party game, let me know.

 fp (fortepiano): This means you start out loud and drop immediately to soft.  Variations include mfp, where you start out medium loud and get soft right away, and ffp, where you start out very loud and get immediately much softer.

pf (pianoforte):  You guessed it.  You start out soft and then instantly crank up the volume.

fz or ffz (forzando or forzato):  Means to begin the note loudly with a heavy accent.

rfz (rinforzando): “Reinforced”  in Italian.  Another way to say “accented.”

sf, sff, sfff (sforzando):  Also basically a heavy accent.

sfz, sffz, sfffz (sforzato):  Pretty much the same as sforzando.  At least according to the music dictionaries.  Actually a lot of people call it sforzando.  Maybe you have to be Italian to really know the difference.  If you can shed some light on any of this, drop me an email about it and I’ll make you famous in the next issue.

A good link to check out is Virginia Tech University’s online Music Dictionary.  (http://www.music.vt.edu/musicdictionary/)  When you click on any of the musical terms you get to hear some Italian guy pronounce them.  (My favorite is pianissississississimo.)

Repeat the words a few times after him and you’ll win the respect and admiration of your music teacher.  Plus you can show off some brand new tongue twisters.

            If you need a reference you can carry to class with you, pick up a copy of the Hal Leonard Pocket Music Dictionary next time you’re in the store. It’s inexpensive ($4.95), won’t weigh your backpack down, and you won’t need to boot it up each time you need to look up a term.