Special end of score bar - What is this and how is it played?
Does anyone know what this is and how it is played? See attched.
thanks!
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I think it is just a fancy way of embellishing a closing double bar. There would be no special way to play it. Is this an antique score? Some publishers in some periods added all sorts of fancy scroll work and other decorations. If you want to replicate it I suggest adding it as an image. See https://musescore.org/en/handbook/3/images
In reply to I think it is just a fancy… by SteveBlower
Thanks. Interesting, but good to know.
Other then that: MuseScore can apply fermatas to barlines, but for those the time stretch won't work
At this "end" point of the piece, instead of taking your hand off the instrument immediately after finishing, it is done "looking at the piece for a while, holding the instrument - as if to continue".
and then
(for example piano) hands are slowly pulled away from the instrument and placed on the knees.
(or, for example, for violin) the bow (bow) is slowly moved away from the instrument, the arm is dropped down and the instrument is slowly moved from the playing position to the rest position.
This way, listeners understand that the piece actually ends at this point.
The purpose of this behavior here is an artistic show that reflects the work.
In reply to At this "end" point of the… by Ziya Mete Demircan
But I am sure a competent player would end the piece appropriately even without the fussy embelishment.
In reply to But I am sure a competent… by SteveBlower
Yes you are right.
And I normally prefer to have a bit of silence at the end of every piece I play. It takes a little time to leave the spirit of the piece/return to reality.
As for this notation: It's like putting an ellipsis at the end of a sentence.
"is it necessary?" I think it may not. If absolutely necessary: only the "point d'orgue (fermata)" above the barline is already sufficient.
That's how the transcripter (or composer) thought it was appropriate at the time.
Maybe he/she wrote it as a warning to the soloists, who immediately salute as soon as the piece was finished; I don't know...
In reply to At this "end" point of the… by Ziya Mete Demircan
Thanks. This is very helpful.
"Does anyone know what this is and how it is played? See attched."
I have often seen this notation for the final measure of a work, but only in manuscript scores. I think that composers used the special notation simply to avoid the complication of drawing a final bar line with two pen nibs of different widths (thin, then thick). Otherwise the final barline could be mistaken for a double barline.
A couple of examples from manuscripts:
![Final_measure_notation_in_manuscript_1.png]( "Final_measure_notation_in_manuscript_1.png")
![Final_measure_notation_in_manuscript_2.png]( "Final_measure_notation_in_manuscript_2.png")
PIANO:
STRING QUARTET:
In reply to _"... Does anyone know what… by DanielR
It is very common in Renaissance and Baroque music to find things like this at the end of a piece, both in manuscript and printed sources. I don't think there is any special implication for performance; it's just a marker. I didn't realize this practice continued, but the examples by DanielR show that it did.
I'm attaching two examples, one from a Scarlatti sonata (MS) and the other from the second book of harpsichord pieces by Pierre Février (18th c. printed). The second has some extra calligraphic dots, which I see on occasion.
In reply to It is very common in… by redux02
//I don't intend to prolong the discussion, but when I saw the examples, I couldn't stop commenting.
In the first example, the fermata on the final barline is clearly visible. // I said in my previous post that a fermata on the final barline might be enough.
The extra dots in the second example have almost the same meaning.
They are not meaningless... Of course, there is an attempt to tell something.
Anyone can interpret it as they wish, or free to ignore them.