Day 24: One Stem to Rule Them All (& Other Issues)
The Note Stem Rule
The note stem rule concerns the direction of the stem of a note. In order to write music neatly, the rule states: If the note head is on or above the middle line of the staff, the stem points down - If the note head is below the middle line, the stem points up:
The stems of written notes point up or down
This rule should help make written music easier to read because, as the examples on this page show, most stems will stay within the staff. Perhaps more importantly is that notes on the grand staff don’t collide into each other:
Notes should not collide into each other unnecessarily
The rule, however, is ignored if it means that the music will be neater and clearer. In the example below, the last two eighth notes (a B
and a C
) have stems going up, but this is because they are part of a larger group of beamed notes.
Multiple Voices on a Staff
The note stem rule is ignored also when one staff serves for writing 2 separate voices or parts. The word ‘voices’ here refers to distinct, individual musical lines and it doesn’t necessarily mean that they are sung. Neither does it necessarily mean that two different instruments play the two lines although this is possible too. In this example by Bach, one guitar plays the 2 distinct and separate lines (2 voices).
Bach: Minuet 1 from Lute Suite no. 4, BWV 1006a
Notice how all the stems of the 1st
voice point upwards and those of the 2nd
voice point downwards. This is done so that the voices remain clearly distinct at all times. The alternative, conforming to the note stem rule, is barely legible:
Writing Rests on the Staff
Finally, take note of how the rests are written on the staff. As the diagram below shows, the whole rest hangs on the fourth line, the half rest sits on the third line, and the others are written around the middle of the staff.
The rest symbols on the staff
