The Short

226 NOTATION OF ARTICULATION AND PHRASING
Almost every important composer of the early nineteenth century can similarly be seen to have used ‘staccato’ or other
instructions for accent, shortening, or particular styles of performance on notes in allegro movements which a
generation earlier might anyway have been expected to be played in a detached manner. Cherubini frequently included
the instruction ‘staccato’ with dotted figures in allegro movements, for example in the overture to Médée (Ex. 6.25,)
Ex. 6.25. Cherubini, Médée, overture
presumably to elicit the type of detached performance that Mozart had, on occasion, taken great pains to indicate by
writing rests in dotted figures in slow movements (Ex. 6.26.) Mendelssohn sometimes made an extremely interesting
juxtaposition of notes that were marked with staccato marks and others that were shortened by means of rests (Ex.
6.27.) In terms of string playing this probably implied a slightly separated bowstroke for the former and a more
pronounced separation for the latter, perhaps with an off-the-string bowstroke. The relatively frequent occurrence of
successions of semiquavers followed by semiquaver rests in Mendelssohn's fast movements 386 seems almost certain to
have been linked with the early nineteenth-century tendency to employ connected
Ex. 6.26. Mozart, Mass in C minor, Qui tollis
386 e.g. in the Scherzo of the Octet op. 20.