(''plural'' ) is a German term used in

musical notation Music notation or musical notation is any system used to visually represent aurally perceived music played with instruments or sung by the human voice through the use of written, printed, or otherwise-produced symbols, including notation fo ...

to denote a

barline In musical notation, a bar (or measure) is a segment of time corresponding to a specific number of beats in which each beat is represented by a particular note value and the boundaries of the bar are indicated by vertical bar lines. Dividing m ...

that is drawn between staves, but not across them. It is typically seen in modern editions of

Medieval In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the Post-classical, post-classical period of World history (field), global history. It began with t ...

and

Renaissance The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history marking the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and covering the 15th and 16th centuries, characterized by an effort to revive and surpass ideas ...

vocal

polyphony Polyphony ( ) is a type of musical texture consisting of two or more simultaneous lines of independent melody, as opposed to a musical texture with just one voice, monophony, or a texture with one dominant melodic voice accompanied by chords, h ...

, where it is intended to allow modern performers the convenience of barlines without having them interfere with the music, which was originally written without barlines. In most cases

note value In music notation, a note value indicates the relative duration of a note, using the texture or shape of the ''notehead'', the presence or absence of a ''stem'', and the presence or absence of ''flags/ beams/hooks/tails''. Unmodified note values ...

s are allowed to cross over a without requiring a tie. The convention of the was introduced by German

musicologist Musicology (from Greek μουσική ''mousikē'' 'music' and -λογια ''-logia'', 'domain of study') is the scholarly analysis and research-based study of music. Musicology departments traditionally belong to the humanities, although some mu ...

s such as

Heinrich Besseler Heinrich Besseler (April 2, 1900 – July 25, 1969) was a German musicologist born in Hörde. He is particularly known for his colossal work, ''Die Musik des Mittelalters und der Renaissance'' (1931), which provided a new perspective on historical m ...

in the 1920s and became common in editorial practice by the mid-20th century. It is frequently applied in academic editions of 15th and 16th century music such as those in the multi-volume ''

Corpus mensurabilis musicae The ''Corpus mensurabilis musicae'' (CMM) is a collected print edition of most of the sacred and secular vocal music of the late medieval and Renaissance period in western music history, with an emphasis on the central Franco-Flemish and Italian re ...

'' published by the

American Institute of Musicology The American Institute of Musicology (AIM) is a musicological organization that researches, promotes and produces publications on early music. Founded in 1944 by Armen Carapetyan, the AIM's chief objective is the publication of modern editions ...

. A few modern composers (such as

Hugo Distler August Hugo Distler (24 June 1908 – 1 November 1942)Slonimsky & Kuhn, ''Baker's Biographical Dictionary of Musicians'', v. 2, p. 889 was a German organist, choral conductor, teacher and composer. Life and career Born in Nuremberg, Distler at ...

, whose vocal music is reminiscent of Renaissance vocal polyphony) have made a practice of using it in their music in order to minimize the regularity of

meter The metre (British spelling) or meter (American spelling; see spelling differences) (from the French unit , from the Greek noun , "measure"), symbol m, is the primary unit of length in the International System of Units (SI), though its prefi ...

References

Musical notation German words and phrases {{Medieval-music-theory-stub