How do you play a grace note tied to the same principal note?
I'm a bit confused as to how to play a particular series of grace notes in two pieces: Schubert's Moment Musicaux No. 3 and Debussy's Menuet. Here are the measures for reference:
In both examples, the first note of the grace note series is tied to its corresponding note on the principal note. In recordings of Moment Musicaux, it sounds like only the tied grace note
is played. In recordings of Menuet, however, it seems like both the grace note and the principal note are played.
How are these intended to be played? Are the tied notes intended to be held as the tie would suggest or is the tie in fact a slur and the "tied" note is meant to be played as well? Or is the answer both, and the difference is the result of different styles/time periods of music?
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A tie can only be between two rhythmically adjacent notes. Since there is a note in between the start and end of that "tie", we know it is actually a slur.
Those grace note figures are really just two-note trills.
In Debussy it is quite probably a slur. It just sounds better that way, I think. Also, in the same culture Ravel used different notation to actually show a tie:
(From Alborada del gracioso)
I'm not sure about Schubert but I think a slur is more logical here, too, because the two-note-chords-with-graces are actually some kind of a recurring motive in the piece. You can also see it as
and ,
and there are other variations without the graces, but in most cases it is a straight chord (instead of, say, an arpeggio).
Using ties for the first instance of the motive (the one in your example) and its repetitions would make them sound quite different from the others. I also think the accents support this non-tied interpretation.
Now, of course, you'll notice that the other examples of the motive shown above do not have a slur, which could indicate that in the first case it is actually a tie.
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