Quarter note

"Crotchet" redirects here. For the needlework technique, see Crochet.
"Negra" redirects here. For other uses, see Negra (disambiguation).
"♩" redirects here. For the general description of the symbol, see Musical note.
Look up quarter note in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

A quarter note (American) or crotchet (British, from the sense 'hook') is a note played for one quarter of the duration of a whole note (or semibreve). Often, musicians will say that a crotchet is one beat, but this is not always correct, as the beat is indicated by the time signature of the music; a quarter note may or may not be the beat. Quarter notes are notated with a filled-in oval note head and a straight, flagless stem. The stem usually points upwards if it is below the middle line of the stave or downwards if it is on or above the middle line. However, the stem direction may differentiate more than one part. The head of the note also reverses its orientation in relation to the stem. (See image.)

Overview

In Unicode, the symbol is U+2669 ().

A quarter note/crotchet with stem pointing up, a quarter note with stem pointing down, and a quarter rest
Four quarter notes. Quarter notes are the smallest note value not beamed together.
Whole note Half note Quarter note Eighth note Sixteenth note Thirty-second note
Comparison of duple note values (whole note = 2×half note, etc.).

A related value is the quarter rest (or crotchet rest). It denotes a silence of the same duration as a quarter note. It typically appears as the symbol , plus, occasionally, as the older symbol .[1][2]

The note derives from the semiminima of mensural notation. The word crotchet comes from Old French crochet, meaning 'little hook', diminutive of croc, 'hook', because of the hook used on the note in black notation. However, because the hook appeared on the eighth note (or quaver) in the later white notation, the modern French term croche refers to an eighth note.

It is played for half the length of a half note and twice that of an eights note . It is one beat in a bar of 4/4. The term quarter note is a calque (loan translation) of the German term Viertelnote. The names of this note (and rest) in most languages are calqued from the same source:

Language note name rest name
Arabic السوداء سكتة السوداء
Bulgarian четвъртинка четвъртинка пауза
Catalan negra silenci de negra
Chinese 四分音符 (pinyin: sìfēn yīnfú) 四分休止符 (pinyin: sìfēn xiūzhǐfú)
Croatian četvrtinka četvrtinska pauza
Czech čtvrťová nota čtvrťová pauza
Danish fjerdedelsnode fjerdedelspause
Dutch kwartnoot kwartrust
Finnish neljäsosanuotti neljäsosatauko
French noire soupir
Galician negra silencio de negra
German Viertelnote Viertelpause
Greek tetarto (τέταρτο) pausi tetartou (παύση τετάρτου)
Italian semiminima pausa di semiminima
Japanese 4分音符 4分休符
Korean 4분음표(四分音標 sabun eumpyo) 4분쉼표(四分-標 sabun swimpyo)
Norwegian fjerdedelsnote fjerdedelspause
Polish ćwierćnuta pauza ćwierćnutowa
Portuguese semínima pausa de semínima
Russian четвертная нота четвертная пауза
Serbian četvrtin(k)a / четвртин(к)а četvrtinska pauza/ четвртинска пауза
Slovak štvrťová nota štvrťová pomlčka
Spanish negra silencio de negra
Swedish fjärdedelsnot fjärdedelspaus
Turkish dörtlük nota dörtlük es
Thai โน๊ตตัวดำ ตัวหยุดตัวดำ

The Galician, Catalan, French, and Spanish names for the note (all of them meaning "black") derive from the fact that the semiminima was the longest note to be colored in mensural white notation, which is true as well of the modern form.

The Bulgarian, Chinese, Croatian, Czech, Japanese, Korean, Polish, Russian, Serbian and Slovak names mean "quarter" (for the note) and "quarter's pause" (for the rest).

Notes

  1. Examples of the older symbol are found in English music up to the late 20th century, e.g. W. A. Mozart Requiem Mass, vocal score ed. W. T. Best, pub. London: Novello & Co. Ltd. 1879
  2. Rudiments and Theory of Music Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music, London 1958. I,33 and III,25. The former shows both forms without distinction, the latter the "old" form only. The book was the standard theory manual in the UK up until at least 1975. The "old" form was taught as a manuscript variant of the printed form.
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