In a piece I wrote many years ago, I put a simple but very clear X through the stem of some notes written for harp. I no longer remember what this means. There is nothing about it in my performance notes, and I can’t track it elsewhere, although it’s probably a Salzedo marking. If not, then maybe something I saw in Berio, a strong influence at the time. Note that this is not muffled. In every instance the symbol is on notes that have longer values and are followed in some cases by laissez viber slur symbols. Can someone who has seen or used this jog my memory?
Hand damping resembles most what you describe a small cross with a circle on the stem but you mention it does not fir the context. There is also a pedal buzz described but that is a Z with a thin line in the middle and not on the stem.
I checked but there is no X on the stem mentioned in Elaine Gould Behind Bars. She also mentions Salzedo’s book and also Kurt Stone Music Notation in. the 20th Century. I d0n’t have that.
Stone has a lengthy section on harp notation, but I don’t see anything there about an X on the stem.
Andrew Stiller’s Handbook of Instrumentation says it’s for muting.
Thanks for the responses. Since posting that, I discovered in my written materials for this composition an explanation: Stems marked with an X are to be played with fingernails. For whatever that’s worth. It may be unstandard, but that’s what I intended, and the most essential thing is to make sure that there’s a guide somewhere to all such matters.
No further responses are necessary.
I think fingernail plucking usually has its own symbol:
Dorico has this available as a factory playing technique:
3 Likes
Just to add to the discussion for anyone reading this thread in the future, there have been some harp discussions if you search.
Some reference books have been mentioned as below:
referring to Harp Scoring (Stanley Chaloupka)
And this video
2 Likes
{@asherber} found exactly what I need, and insertable from a popover no less. That’s perfect.
I have not actually added symbols to notes to be produced this way. (Mostly because I didn’t know how to do it.) Now I can flip through and do them all at once. There’s probably a dozen.
If anyone cares, I finished the insertion of notes and rhythms and a lot of articulations and dynamics phase of this complicated score on Friday. It’s my first major project, and although I used Finale for probably 25 years and have always wanted a computer engraved edition of this old composition (28 pages of score, about 8 and a half minutes of music), I never did it because I thought it would be too hard and I’d never finish it. I’m pretty impressed how quickly I’m coming up to speed on Dorico.
6 Likes