Forum: music.stackexchange.com
Tags: <notation><sheet-music>
Title: How do you draw a quarter rest with a pen/pencil?
Question: It seems to me that the quarter rest we see everywhere was drawn with a calligraphy pen. I don't have one of those - I have a sharpened/mechanical pencil or a ball-point pen. So usually when I try to imitate the shape of a quarter rest, it looks a lot like a  3 .  What is a proper/accepted "thin" version of the quarter rest symbol?

Answers:
sents: text: From: Music Notation Drawing Rests Theory Project 2: Preparing Scores To draw the quarter rest, draw the right side of a letter “R”, omitting the vertical, or start with a number “2”, but pull the horizontal line down on the right.
text: Put the hook on the bottom and it’s done.
text: The quarter rest is a letter “R” suitable for being placed next to a letter with a vertical right side.
text: It’s right out of Gutenberg’s Bible.
text: The hook on the bottom is merely embellishment.
text: The “classical” quarter rest is a mirror-reversed 8th rest.
text: Don’t use it.
text: Some people draw a version of the “S” rest which was introduced in the very early 1800’s to replace the “classical” rest.
text: The “S” rest is like an S or backwards “Z” with the top and bottom concave instead of convex or straight.
text: Another way to draw it is to make a line down and curving left, straight to the right, and then curving left and down.
text: That is the easiest way to start, and I recommend it to you.
text: If you rotate that clockwise you have an “S” rest.
text: Or copy the eighth doubled and backwards.
text: Or chop away half of both curves of a Gutenberg rest.
text: There is a lot of variation to be found in the quarter rest.
text: The problem with the Gutenberg rest is that it takes too much vertical space and therefore collides with other rests or notes too often.
text: For handwriting music, the Gutenberg rest and the classical rest are the worst, in my opinion.
answer_details: author: music.stackexchange.com/users/656/mplungjan
score: 67
sents: text: I was taught to use a lower case z with a lower case c under it, with the bottom of the z touching the top of the c.
answer_details: author: music.stackexchange.com/users/450/blindjesse
score: 20
sents: text: I draw a quarter note using two pen strokes.
text: In the picture below I've used a narrow ballpoint pen.
text: If you use a slightly fatter pen the 2-3 and 4-5 lines will touch, creating the impression that the character was drawn with an italic pen.
text: The change in width is a valuable visual clue and makes it look much more like a printed quarter note rest.
text: This is easy to write and looks better than a quarter note drawn with a single pen stroke.
text: Also, its appearance is more familiar and easier to read than the reverse eighth note rest suggested elsewhere.
answer_details: author: music.stackexchange.com/users/9426/Brian THOMAS
score: 10
sents: text: I was always taught to write a slanted 2 and then make a c below it.
answer_details: author: music.stackexchange.com/users/1792/Ewa
score: 5
sents: text: In Britain we would simply draw a lower case z in the middle of the stave, and this is considered legible.
text: It's what we teach children, too.
answer_details: author: music.stackexchange.com/users/2069/Marian
score: 5

Summary of the answers:
 From:  Music Notation Drawing Rests    Theory Project 2: Preparing Scores   To draw the quarter rest, draw the  right side of a letter “R”, omitting  the vertical, or start with a number  “2”, but pull the horizontal line down  on the right. In Britain we would simply draw a lower case z in the middle of the stave, and this is considered legible. Others consider that the quarter rest  is a letter “R” suitable for being  placed next to a letter with a  vertical right side. Thus, no real consensus.
The quarter rest can be drawn by  simply drawing a lower case z in the middle of the stave, or writing a slanted 2 and then make a c below it. From Music Notation, Drawing Rests: To draw the quarter rest, draw the  right side of a letter “R”, omitting  the vertical, or start with a number  “2”, but pull the horizontal line down  on the right.