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When I want to denote the staccato of a chord with some notes that are really close, like this: enter image description here

Do I need a dot over each note? Is one dot over one of the notes enough?

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Shevliaskovic
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    Shev, you would put both the sharp and natural on the left hand side of the two noteheads. – Bob Broadley Feb 21 '16 at 11:00
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    Although, some composers use split stems to reach pairs of noteheads like these. Bartok is an example. – Bob Broadley Feb 21 '16 at 11:04
  • @BobBroadley what do you mean with your first comment exactly? That the notation would be 'sharp,natural,notehead, notehead' ? – Shevliaskovic Feb 21 '16 at 11:36
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    Yes. That's right. – Bob Broadley Feb 21 '16 at 11:40
  • Really? I don't recall having seen it like that. – Shevliaskovic Feb 21 '16 at 12:46
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    I would recommend making that G# an Ab. I've never seen "sharp,note,natural,note" before, and neither have I seen "sharp,natural,note,note". – SirPython Feb 21 '16 at 14:08
  • @SirPython - what a great idea. Even if it's technically incorrect, it would be simpler to read, and look better. – Tim Feb 21 '16 at 14:34
  • @Tim Thanks! Out of curiosity, why would it be technically incorrect? Is it something to do with mixing sharps and flats? – SirPython Feb 21 '16 at 14:51
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    @SirPython - that may be one problem, another could be that the 'changed' note should be a G#, say, as an augmented, so it shouldn't be written as an Ab, but sometimes rules need to be broken. Isn't that why we make 'em? – Tim Feb 21 '16 at 16:09
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    If I were writing this I would put noteheads on adjacent note names and use accidentals to bring them closer together. I agree with @SirPython that the G# should be notated as an A♭ instead, since that will make it a lot clearer. If for some reason it seems really bad to have an A♭ in the harmonic context, then I suggest an Fx (double sharp) instead of the G♮. – Todd Wilcox Feb 21 '16 at 16:37
  • @ToddWilcox - that way, each note head is far easier to see, and would be sitting on the same side as each other. Good idea! – Tim Feb 21 '16 at 17:46
  • If the notes are too close together, then space them farther apart! – Carl Witthoft Feb 21 '16 at 22:45
  • @Shevliaskovic I have, although I can't think of an example right now. There's an example of split stems in the second measure of the code in Chopin's second Ballade, although some earlier editions use two sets of bars instead. – BobRodes Feb 22 '16 at 03:01
  • @CarlWitthoft and what would I get by that? Per Tim's answer, the staccato is stem specific, not notehead specific – Shevliaskovic Feb 22 '16 at 06:00
  • Notes on a common stem are not the same as "notes close together." – Carl Witthoft Feb 22 '16 at 12:28
  • In this case they are – Shevliaskovic Feb 22 '16 at 12:29

1 Answers1

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Staccato is stem specific rather than head specific. Thus one dot will suffice. The other way would be to make the note actually exactly as long (short!) as you want, then put the appropriate rest. Staccato itself, to me, is a bit vague, and can be interpreted in subtly different ways, as far as note length - brevity - is concerned.

Tim
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  • It is not vague it means detached. – Neil Meyer Feb 21 '16 at 11:41
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    @NeilMeyer - not every performer will play staccato the same is what I mean. One person's detached is another's... When there is a specific note length followed by a rest, then it's absolute. – Tim Feb 21 '16 at 11:58
  • I know that a rest would be more precise, but I was wondering for the staccato of a chord – Shevliaskovic Feb 21 '16 at 12:47
  • @Shevliaskovic - it's a fair question,I just try to add a little extra if poss. See SirPython's comment. – Tim Feb 21 '16 at 14:37
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    For me, staccato has the same length regardless of tempo, whereas a note value is affected by tempo. If i were re-interpreting something and changing the tempo, or using rubato, the difference between staccato and a precise note value would matter. I see them as two very different things and personally would not be inclined to substitute one for the other. Dots go with stems gets you +1 though. – Todd Wilcox Feb 21 '16 at 16:40
  • @ToddWilcox - I always thought staccato meant play the note for approx. half its length, so in a slow piece, a staccato crotchet, for example, should be played as a quaver with a quaver rest following, making that staccato note longer than the same crotchet in a faster tempo piece. I've been wrong before! – Tim Feb 21 '16 at 17:43
  • @NeilMeyer From wikipedia: "In 20th-century music, a dot placed above or below a note indicates that it should be played staccato, and a wedge is used for the more emphatic staccatissimo...some theorists from as early as the 1750s distinguished different degrees of staccato through the use of dots and dashes...A number of signs came to be used in the late 19th and early 20th centuries to discriminate more subtle nuances of staccato...dots, vertical and horizontal dashes, vertical and horizontal wedges, and the like." So, "detached" is a bit of a vague term, or there wouldn't be all this. – BobRodes Feb 22 '16 at 02:51
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    @Tim There are no hard and fast rules for this, but I personally don't think of it that way. Staccato is an effect that I take to be (fairly) consistent for a given note, independent of its length. In the end, it's a matter of feel; sometimes a "harder" staccato is called for, and sometimes a "softer" one is more appropriate. All of the attempts to make various distinctions in staccato in my comment to NeilMeyer didn't really take, primarily because the tendency of 20th-century composers for performance micromanagement never really took either. – BobRodes Feb 22 '16 at 02:57
  • @BobRodes - agreed, as musos, we probably play something like what was intended. But with composer's hat on, if I want a specific staccato, rather than a translated one, I'm a bit stuck. It'll get played how the performer wants/feels it. Maybe not what I intended. – Tim Feb 22 '16 at 07:44
  • @Tim Yeah, if you want it played as you intended, you have to play it yourself. :) Otherwise, you're stuck with a collaboration with the performer. A famous story has Chopin scolding Liszt to play his Etudes as written, rather than "jazzing them up" as he was wont to do. Liszt is supposed to have stopped, thought about it, and decided that Chopin's request was reasonable. – BobRodes Mar 04 '16 at 06:35