Talk:forces

forces as a musical term

I have added an entry for (music). It may be important to understand that this usage is de facto - the term is not found in this context as a specific entry in any Merriam-Webster (M-W) publication, American Heritage Dictionary (AHD), Oxford English Dictionary (OED) or the Oxford Dictionary of Music, or in the encyclopedic 29-volume The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians.

However, the term forces, nearly always but not exclusively in the plural form, is found throughout the literature concerning music. Rather than creating a new Citations page for the forces entry, I will give a few examples here in this Discussion section.

• from the authoritative New Grove Dictionary:
  • "Giay [Giai, Giaj], Giovanni Antonio": "After Fiorè died in 1732, Giay assumed the duties of maestro di cappella and was confirmed in the position by Carlo Emanuele III in a patent of 24 October 1738. In this capacity he directed the instrumental and vocal forces of the court and composed a large amount of church music."
  • "Hakenberger, Andrzej (Andreas)": "While a few multi-voice works are for a single choir, Hakenberger clearly favoured antiphonal forces. These opposing choirs, which may consist of instruments as well as voices, usually have an equal number of parts, but contrast between a high and a low choir is preferred to equal forces."
  • "Lutz, (Johann Baptist Wilhelm) Meyer": "... he became deputy organist of the Roman Catholic cathedral in Birmingham, St Chad’s, before moving to St George’s Roman Catholic Cathedral, Southwark (London) as its first organist and choirmaster, in which post (1848–74) he gave performances of numerous orchestral masses, including his own, with professional forces."
  • "Maazel, Lorin (Varencove)": "His Covent Garden début was not until 1978 with Verdi's Luisa Miller, which he recorded the following year with Royal Opera House forces."
  • "Negri, Gino": "Negri composed almost exclusively for the theatre, particularly works for small forces, which he found most congenial."
• from the Wikipedia article on Orchestra:
  • "Beethoven's influence": "The so-called "standard complement" of double winds and brass in the orchestra from the first half of the 19th century is generally attributed to the forces called for by Ludwig van Beethoven..."
  • "20th century orchestra": "... Mahler pushes the furthest boundaries of orchestral size, employing huge forces."
• in a use of the singular form, again from New Grove Dictionary:
  • "Janáček, Leoš [Leo Eugen]": "After a few months he turned the male-voice Beseda choir into a mixed body, and, with help from the monastery choir and pupils from the institute, he mustered a force of 250 singers for large-scale choral works, Mozart’s Requiem (1878) and Beethoven’s Missa solemnis (1879)."

Milkunderwood 03:25, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Quote re forces as synonym of troops

In recent years broadcast media have been using this meaning (which really grates on my ears), with which I was unacquainted. (I was aware of the military meaning of forces as a plural of 'force' with meaning of a collection of personnel and weapons, as in "the two air forces" or "the third task force will join the other two forces".) I was disappointed to discover that in fact the usage of forces as a synonym of troops was not simply a recent barbaric invention by finding a quote from 1775: "these one thousand forces are to continue at Ticonderoga". Maybe someone will want to add this into the entry. It's online at https://digital.lib.niu.edu/islandora/object/niu-amarch%3A102298 and at archive.org. --R. S. Shaw (talk) 19:44, 22 February 2022 (UTC)