arrange

Formsarranges, arranging, arranged

Pluralarranges

1. 1
   verbtransitive

   To organize things or set them into an orderly sequence or layout.

   Like sorting a deck of cards into suits and numbers.

   Volunteers arrange the donated goods by category before the sale.

   She arranged the photographs into a timeline of her childhood.

   Similarorganize, order

   Oppositedisarrange, disorganize, jumble, scatter

   Note

   The oldest sense, and the one the word's history explains. Middle English arengen meant to draw up a battle line, borrowed from Old French arengier, 'to put in a row', which is built on rang, 'line, row, rank'. Caxton, in 1485, still uses it of people drawn up around a horse. Its synonym range keeps that row-making idea, though today the things set in order are more often furniture, goods or photographs.

2. 2
   verbtransitive or intransitive

   To plan something or prepare for it in advance.

   The committee arranged the conference months in advance.

   Travelers should arrange for travel insurance before departing.

   Similarorganize, plan, schedule, prepare

   Note

   Here the order is imposed on events still to come rather than on objects in a room, which separates it from putting things in order. It takes several constructions: a direct object (arrange the trip), a to-infinitive (arrange to meet), for plus a noun (arrange for supper), or a that-clause, as in the passive of the American novelist Winston Churchill's The Celebrity (1897): "It had been arranged … that Mr. Cooke was to drive."

3. 3
   verbtransitive or intransitive

   To prepare and adapt an existing musical composition for performance in a form other than its original.

   She began to arrange for the local jazz band last year.

   He arranged the ballad for two guitars and a cello.

   Similarscore, adapt, orchestrate, transcribe

   Note

   In music the object is a finished piece. The work is reassigning its voices, instruments or texture for other performers, as in a ballad arranged for two guitars and cello. Used without an object, arrange for names the ensemble being written for, as in arranging for a jazz band. That can look like the planning sense, where arrange for supper means seeing that supper is provided. The result of this work is called an arrangement.

4. 4
   nounJapancountable

   A rendition of a song that has been rearranged from its original form; an arrangement.

   Every track on the Kyoto group's new disc is an arrange of a song from the original game.

   He spent a month on the arrange, trading the synth lead for shamisen before the Comiket release.

   Similararrangement, remix, rendition

   Note

   A noun at home in English around Japanese music, where a reworked version of a song is simply an arrange, and several of them are arranges. Elsewhere listeners say arrangement, and the bare noun can look like a slip for it, so it is safest kept to that setting. It mirrors the verb for adapting music: what the arranger produces is named with the verb itself.

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