Spiccato is a bowing technique for

string instrument String instruments, stringed instruments, or chordophones are musical instruments that produce sound from vibrating strings when a performer plays or sounds the strings in some manner. Musicians play some string instruments by plucking the ...

s in which the bow appears to bounce lightly upon the string. The term comes from the past participle of the Italian verb ''spiccare'', meaning "to separate". The terms '' martelé'', ''

saltando A variety of musical terms are likely to be encountered in printed scores, music reviews, and program notes. Most of the terms are Italian, in accordance with the Italian origins of many European musical conventions. Sometimes, the special mu ...

'', and ''

sautillé Playing the violin entails holding the instrument between the jaw and the collar bone (see below for variations of this posture). The strings are sounded either by drawing the bow across them (''arco''), or by plucking them (''pizzicato''). The ...

'' describe similar techniques.

Technique

In typically consistent rhythms (of

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s or

semiquaver Figure 1. A 16th note with stem facing up, a 16th note with stem facing down, and a 16th rest. Figure 2. Four 16th notes beamed together. In music, a 1/16, sixteenth note ( American) or semiquaver (British) is a note played for half the dur ...

s, or quicker repeated sounds), the bow is held in a more relaxed manner and allowed to bounce, resulting in a series of short, distinct notes. This occurs because of the elasticity of the string and the natural springiness of the bow. The ability to create the effect is largely tempo-dependent. In slower tempos, a spiccato can also be manufactured using the fingers and wrist to deliberately manipulate how the bow falls to the string. The speed with which the ''spiccato'' is performed depends on bow placement. At the balance point – about a third from the

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– the ''spiccato'' will be slow, while above the middle of the bow the speed will increase. The speed can also be controlled by varying the height of the bow above the string: the higher the bow bounces, the longer the time required for the bow to return to the string, and therefore the slower the resulting ''spiccato''. The character of the ''spiccato'' can be varied by altering the tilt and placement of the bow to use more or fewer hairs. When using the full bow hair, the bow bounces more and has a shorter character, while when the bow hair is angled, the character of the spiccato becomes more mellow and longer.

History

According to David Boyden and Peter Walls in ''

The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians ''The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians'' is an encyclopedic dictionary of music and musicians. Along with the German-language ''Die Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart'', it is one of the largest reference works on the history and theo ...

'', the terms ''spiccato'' and ''

staccato Staccato (; Italian for "detached") is a form of musical articulation. In modern notation, it signifies a note of shortened duration, separated from the note that may follow by silence. It has been described by theorists and has appeared in music ...

'' were regarded as equivalent before the mid-18th century. They cite, for example, Sébastien de Brossard's ''Dictionnaire de musique'', 1703, and

Michel Corrette Michel Corrette (10 April 1707 – 21 January 1795) was a French composer, organist and author of musical method books. Life Corrette was born in Rouen, Normandy. His father, Gaspard Corrette, was an organist and composer. Little is known of ...

's ''L'École d'Orphée'', 1738. ''Spiccato'' meant, they write, "simply detached or separated as opposed to legato." The distinctive use of the term ''spiccato'' for the bouncing bowstroke emerged in the later 18th century. Although it was an important technique for 19th-century violinists, its use increased significantly in the 20th century. The ability to perform ''spiccato'' was facilitated by the development of the Tourte bow – the modern bow, in which the bow had a

concave Concave or concavity may refer to: Science and technology * Concave lens * Concave mirror Mathematics * Concave function, the negative of a convex function * Concave polygon, a polygon which is not convex * Concave set * The concavity In ca ...

curve, developed by

François Tourte François Xavier Tourte (1747 – 25 April 1835) was a French bow maker who made a number of significant contributions to the development of the bow of stringed instruments, and is considered to be the most important figure in the development of ...

partly in collaboration with

Giovanni Battista Viotti Giovanni Battista Viotti (12 May 1755 – 3 March 1824) was an Italian violinist whose virtuosity was famed and whose work as a composer featured a prominent violin and an appealing lyrical tunefulness. He was also a director of French and Italia ...

References

{{Violin family Articulations (music) String performance techniques Italian words and phrases