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I found this vertical dash on some sheet music and I can't figure out what it is or what does it mean. I've tried looking through Wikipedia's list of symbols, but I couldn't find it there and me searching for a vertical line on the staff only yealded results about barlines

sheetmusic

The image is a snippet from Lutheran church music for the organ, specifically, it's Bach's Jesu, wahres Brot des Lebens or a similar piece by Johan Crüger/Johan Frank deck thyself my soul with gladness. I don't have the sheet music at hand at the moment so I can't be sure which

Edit2: Did some looking around and found a picture of the full piece on my harddrive. Full piece

Arnas Šniokaitis
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  • What it looks like to me is that it was originally written with the D on the same beat as the C# and the slash is the rest of the stem. You'll notice the stem on the D is a little shorter than normal too. – Duston Feb 16 '24 at 19:40
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    Closely related if not a duplicate: https://music.stackexchange.com/questions/70009/what-is-the-meaning-of-this-small-vertical-line – Dekkadeci Feb 16 '24 at 20:30
  • @Dekkadeci That one seems limited to Adams – Andy Bonner Feb 16 '24 at 21:09
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    Also either closely related or an outright duplicate: https://music.stackexchange.com/questions/73894/whats-the-meaning-of-the-separator – Dekkadeci Feb 16 '24 at 21:27
  • Knowing that it's a Bach organ work, I'm going to double down on the possibility that it marks an instance of a theme. Also, sometimes in hymnals we see markings like this showing places that the organist might choose to use as an introduction (more often an angle bracket, but sometimes I've seen other marks for secondary-choice spots). At any rate, it ought to be explained in the edition. When you get a chance, please share a larger screenshot with more context. – Andy Bonner Feb 16 '24 at 22:21
  • Related: Odd symbol in Béla Bartók's Mikrokosmos Book 1 – Elements In Space Feb 17 '24 at 06:29

1 Answers1

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It’s a “breath” mark. In vocal or wind instrument parts, its meaning is literal: take a quick breath. In piano music it’s like a phrase mark and means to leave a little space (I.e. a “breath”) between the two notes on either side. It’s not common in piano music, but not unusual.

Aaron
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    Is it, though? Typographically, it looks to me more like things i’ve seen to mark the theme in a fugue, or metric meanings like situations in which there’s a reason to demarcate a half bar, like for phrasing purposes – Andy Bonner Feb 16 '24 at 20:23
  • I thought a breath mark was a comma, and as a mark on a piano score, there's probably only one well-known player who'd use it... or were there several..? – Tim Feb 16 '24 at 20:35
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    Does it differ from a comma breath mark or from a caesura? – Arnas Šniokaitis Feb 16 '24 at 20:57
  • @ArnasŠniokaitis It's the same as a comma. Not a full break, but a quick breath. – Aaron Feb 16 '24 at 23:22
  • @Tim Commas are more common, but tics are also used. – Aaron Feb 16 '24 at 23:22
  • @AndyBonner Yes, it could be either of those things, especially now that we know it's Bach, but interpretively it still amounts to much the same thing. It seems likely it's marking a fugal theme, given the composer, but there's not enough information to be sure. – Aaron Feb 16 '24 at 23:24
  • is there a difference between it and a comma denoted breath mark? Because in my choir I found both used and I don't know what makes them distinct? – Arnas Šniokaitis Feb 22 '24 at 18:19
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    @ArnasŠniokaitis If both are in the same piece, then the comma represents a more significant break, as at the end of a phrase, while the tic is a quick breath. If they're in different pieces, then the likely mean the same thing, which you'd confirm by looking at the context. – Aaron Feb 22 '24 at 18:33