Do better than soft fool, almost certain to be in front (7)
I believe the answer is:
surpass
'do better than' is the definition.
(I've seen this in another clue)
'soft fool almost certain to be in front' is the wordplay.
'soft' becomes 'p' (musical abbreviation for 'piano').
'fool' becomes 'ass' (both can mean a stupid person).
'almost' means to remove the last letter (most of the word but not all of it).
'certain' becomes 'sure' (synonyms).
'to be in front' says to put letters next to each other.
'sure' with its final letter taken away is 'sur'.
'p'+'ass'='pass'
'pass' put after 'sur' is 'SURPASS'.
(Other definitions for surpass that I've seen before include "Be better than (another)" , "Go one better" , "Outstrip" , "Be better than (own best)" , "Exceed" .)