Forum: music.stackexchange.com
Tags: <notation>
Title: How to configure slur with tie when writing choral music?
Question: I'm writing a choral piece in 12/8 where the basses have a dotted quarter C, tied to a dotted half, tied to a dotted quarter, and then slurred to a C# - all while on the same syllable. How should I configure the slurs and ties to best show this:  Like this?   Or like this?   Thanks!

Answers:
sents: text: The first solution is correct.
text: The slur should start at the beginning of the first note under the slur.
text: The second solution is difficult to sight read.
text: It seems ambiguous at first glance, and it is only with careful analysis that one realizes that it isn't.
text: I'll try to remember to edit this answer to cite some examples of this notation sometime in the next couple of days.
answer_details: author: music.stackexchange.com/users/2257/phoog
score: 7
sents: text: In such a situation you should set the slur above the system to make it better readable.
text: But there are other alternatives:
text: The slur could end on an other syllable in the next bar.
text: The time could be notated in 4/4 and with triplets: in this bar you’d have just a dotted half-note.
text: Edit: As you say below your question the slur is underlying the word ye-ni , what means long year .
text: So I wouldn’t interrupt the phrasing of this word, as it would be 2 short years.
text: (S. my comment above).
text: The slur must end at the last note of the 2nd syllable of ye-ni to make sense.
answer_details: author: music.stackexchange.com/users/56219/Albrecht Hügli
score: 3
sents: text: A tie simply gives the opportunity to make longer notes than are available, or need to go across a bar line.
text: A slur 'joins together' a series of notes, (which are usually not the same pitch), that would then be played 'all in one breath'.
text: Since what you show isn't even the full word, it might be better still to make the slur curve between the beginning and end syllables.
text: However, if you only want the first part to be slurred, you're joining all the notes from the first utterance of 'y', not the end of it, so the second example isn't good anyway.
text: The first is fine for as far as we can see, but bear in mind my earlier thought.
answer_details: author: music.stackexchange.com/users/2808/Tim
score: 1
sents: text: Certainly not the second example.
text: The first is correct.
text: Maybe putting the melisma (one syllable, several notes)
text: slur on top would be clearer.
answer_details: author: music.stackexchange.com/users/17003/Laurence Payne
score: 1
sents: text: The first solution is most correct, although the slur could be placed above the note stems instead.
text: The second solution may appear to performers to be a typo, and interpretation of the composer's intent may be debated.
text: That aside, I'm wondering why you need to slur a note that's held across a single syllable.
text: If a breath should be taken in the middle of the syllable after the C#, perhaps a breath mark would suffice better than ending a slur (assuming the note after the C# holds the same syllable).
text: The end of a slur in the middle of a held syllable across notes may also be open up to interpretation by the performers as they won't know whether to take a breath or keep the syllable held as they normally would have.
text: So for this instance I'd say don't use a slur or if anything use a breath mark where intended.
answer_details: author: music.stackexchange.com/users/63789/Chris
score: 1
sents: text: If more than two notes are tied together, there should be a separate tie connecting every note but the last to its successor.
text: If more than two notes are slurred together, however, they should generally all use one slur unless layout considerations force them to be placed separately
text: (e.g. if a slurred passage doesn't fit on one line).
text: Although not all engravers are consistent with this, it is useful to place ties between the notes being connected, while slurs should extend between points that are above and below the notes in question.
text: If one makes ties and slurs visually distint in that manner, there will be no confusion about whether something is a tie or a slur.
text: Otherwise, if has a curved mark which connects a point above or below a note that has an accidental with a note on the same staff position in the next measure, it may be unclear whether it's a tie that extends the duration of a note that sustains the altered pitch, or a slur which connects an altered note in one measure with an unaltered note in the next.
text: If ties are placed horizontally between notes, then ties and slurs would be recognizable as different.
answer_details: author: music.stackexchange.com/users/5603/supercat
score: 0

Summary of the answers:
What you show isn't he full word. So, it might be better to make the slur curve between the beginning and the end syllables. However, if you only want the first part to be slurred, you're joining all the notes from the first utterance of 'y', not the end of it, so the second example isn't good anyway.
If more than two notes are slurred together, they should all use one slur