The PSALM Liturgical Music Resource
Special topic: Note values at the ends of phrases
- The end of a musical phrase (in Common Chant liturgical recitative) does not always correspond with the end of a textual phrase. To make the dovetailing of two musical phrases correlate to the textual phrasing (thereby improving intelligibility of the phrasing), the following conventions should be followed:
- If the punctuation at the end of a textual phrase is a period or a colon or semi-colon marking the end of a thought, the final note of the musical phrase should be either
- A whole note, if the following phrase begins with a downbeat (i.e. a strong, accented syllable)
- A dotted half note, if the following phrase begins with a pickup beat (i.e. a weak, unaccented syllable)
- If the end of a textual phrase contains no punctuation, or a comma, or a semi-colon that does not mark the end of a thought, the final note of the musical phrase should be either
- A half note, if the following phrase begins with a downbeat
- A dotted half note, if the following phrase begins with a pickup beat
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