Acciaccatura
A crushed grace note, almost without duration
Related
An acciaccatura is a grace note crushed quickly before the principal note: it takes almost no duration, like a momentary impact that pushes the main note out. It is often written as a small note with a slash.
It differs from the long appoggiatura: the long one takes part of the principal note's value, the acciaccatura only an instant. The usual mistake is to treat them as interchangeable — the same spot written as one or the other sounds and weighs completely differently; the acciaccatura is colour, the appoggiatura is structure.
Read deeper → appoggiatura
Sources
- 短倚音的记谱与演奏，参 The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, "Acciaccatura"；本文为原创表述
Used for fact-checking only; all prose is original.