Unexpected Accent

[Ron Ofir]

Reading through Bach's Orchestral Suite no. 3 in G - Gigue's score, I bumped into some notation I don't understand. In the attached image, you will see six quavers divided into two groups of three, each with a slur. Above the last note, you will see a sharp accent, what does it mean?

[Thorolf]

It’s simply an old notation for accidental sharps, to put it above in stead of in front of.

[stevel]

Originally Posted by Ron Ofir

Reading through Bach's Orchestral Suite no. 3 in G - Gigue's score, I bumped into some notation I don't understand. In the attached image, you will see six quavers divided into two groups of three, each with a slur. Above the last note, you will see a sharp accent, what does it mean?

And just to be clear, it's not an accent.

In older notation, especially in early music, accidentals were not put in the music where they were "understood".

Editors add them in for modern readers and put them above the staff to show they weren't in the original, but that they should be played as a sharp (or whatever).

Steve

[Ron Ofir]

Aha! Thank you very much! You have been given cookies.

[VicDiesel]

I'm a bit surprised to see this in Bach; it was much more common to do this a century earlier.

Btw, these accidentals over the note are called "ficta".

Victor.