Talk:Slur (music)

Legato

As it currently reads, this seems to me an excellent article. I find the last clause of the following sentence a bit troublesome, however:

"The ligature or phrase mark is a curved line that extends over a passage which is visually indistinguishable from the slur, and indicates that the passage is to be interpreted as a single phrase, this implies legato only and not slurring."

This seems to me to assume that all phrases should be played legato. It also seems to make a distinction between legato and slurring. It should be clear, I think, that for the piano legato and slurring are one. I would go even further and suggest that when wind instruments take a series of notes on the same tonguing and string instruments take a series of notes on the same bow that this these are the customary ways of implementing legato on these respective sets of instruments (although it is of course possible for string instruments to play detached notes on the same bow as well). The immediate solution that occurs to me is simply to delete this last clause. Does anyone care either to defend it or to suggest an alternative solution? TheScotch 10:44, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

Meanwhile, I've removed the clause.TheScotch 09:10, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

Tied notes

Can someone clarify how to slur tied notes? Eg if a slured passage begins with two tied notes, do we connect the slur on the first or second notes of the tied notes? I've checked several scores, and different editors and houses seem to use different conventions. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.90.210.194 (talk) 08:09, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

I don't understand the question completely, but I would suggest that you get yourself some program like Finale or Sibelius and try it out by yourself. Another (open source) alternative is a score writer called LilyPond, that is similar to Donald Knuth's Tex system. Maybe there is some sort of logically "default" way of do that. Otherwise just post some picture of the scores you mentioned for comparison. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.85.239.236 (talk) 18:35, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

A tied note is in reality only one note. Tying notes is merely one way of noting durations, particularly when the duration extends beyond a bar line. So if the slur or phrase mark includes the tie I can't how it can be interpreted in any other way the beginning at the begining of the note. You could have, for example, either a half note or 2 tied quarter notes, this is the same thing. Either the slur or phrase begins on the note or it doesn't. Wschart (talk) 20:29, 16 May 2010 (UTC)

When slur starts with tied notes, generally it starts with the first note of the tie. please refer OP 27, No.2, Movement II (Ludvig Van Beethoven, Moonlight Sonata, Allegretto) 9th to 16th bars. --wikieinstein (talk) 11:47, 15 December 2011 (UTC)

Ambivalent Phrase

"In guitar music, the slur indicates that the notes should be played without plucking the individual strings, i.e. hammer-ons and pull-offs."

This phrase is slightly confusing because it incorporates both possibly imaginable meanings. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.85.239.236 (talk) 18:25, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

Meaning of slur

1)I think the article is not conveying the actual meaning of slur from its description, but describing more about how to play them on stringed instruments. While agreeing to the fact that the notes under slur shall not be disconnected, slur needs to be separated from the adjacent notes / slurs by introducing breaks. These are musical 'sentences' and the breaks are executed by changing the bow direction in stringed instruments, picking on guitar etc. It will be appropriate to add how slurs are articulated on piano also as stringed and wind instruments are already listed. On Piano and Organ, slur is executed by rolling the hand during slur and by lifting it from the keyboard/ manual after playing the last note of the slur. 2) It is slightly misguiding to say that slurs are always played with legatos. There are many passages in western classical where staccatos are under slur. In such cases, notes are played as mezzo staccatos only but the end of the slur is articulated as staccato or staccatissimo. Again the idea is to instruct the performer to create the musical 'sentence' as indented by the composer. Hope we need to improve this article for more accuracy. --wikieinstein (talk) 11:47, 15 December 2011 (UTC)

History?

When was this symbol first used? I'm not sure I've seen one in music prior to the baroque era.

There must be some first known example of its use. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 23.119.205.88 (talk) 23:37, 27 October 2014 (UTC)

Merger proposal

I propose merging Slur (music) into Legato. The topics are essentially the same. Please discuss at Talk:Legato#Merger proposal. —Anomalocaris (talk) 19:10, 7 October 2021 (UTC)