Quarter note

A quarter note (American) or crotchet (British) is a note played for one quarter of the duration of a whole note (or semibreve). Often people will say that a crotchet is one beat, however, this is not always correct, as the beat is indicated by the time signature of the music; a quarter note may or may not be the beat. Quarter notes are notated with a filled-in oval note head and a straight, flagless stem. The stem usually points upwards if it is below the middle line of the stave or downwards if it is on or above the middle line. However, the stem direction may differentiate more than one part. The head of the note also reverses its orientation in relation to the stem. (See image.)

In Unicode, the symbol is U+2669 (♩).

A quarter note with stem facing up, a quarter note with stem facing down, and a quarter rest

A related value is the quarter rest (or crotchet rest). It denotes a silence of the same duration as a quarter note. It typically appears as the symbol and occasionally as the older symbol .^[1]

The note derives from the semiminima of mensural notation. The word crotchet comes from Old French crochet, meaning 'little hook', diminutive of croc, 'hook', because of the hook used on the note in black notation. However, because the hook appeared on the eighth note (or quaver) in the later white notation, the modern French term croche refers to an eighth note.^{[citation needed]}

It is played for half the length of a minim and twice that of a quaver. It is one beat in a bar of 4/4. The term quarter note is a calque (loan translation) of the German term Viertelnote. The names of this note (and rest) in most languages are calqued from the same source:

Language	note name	rest name
Czech	čtvrťová nota	čtvrťová pauza
Dutch	kwartnoot	kwartrust
French	noire	soupir
German	Viertelnote	Viertelpause
Greek	Tetarto (τέταρτο)	Pausi tetartou (παύση τετάρτου)
Italian	semiminima	pausa di semiminima
Polish	ćwierćnuta	pauza ćwierćnutowa
Portuguese	semínima	pausa de semínima
Russian	четвертная нота	четвертная пауза
Spanish	negra	silencio de negra
Swedish	fjärdedelsnot	fjärdedelspaus
Finnish	Neljäsosanuotti	Neljäsosatauko
Turkish	dörtlük nota	dörtlük es
Chinese	四分音符	四分休止符

The French and Spanish names for the note (both meaning "black") derive from the fact that the semiminima was the longest note to be colored in mensural white notation, which is true as well of the modern form.

The Greek and Chinese names mean "quarter" (for the note) and "quarter's pause" (for the rest). In Greek, all music rests are called "pauses."

See also

• Dotted quarter note
• Musical notation

Notes

1. ^ Examples of the older symbol are found in English music up to the early 20th century, e.g. W. A. Mozart Requiem Mass, vocal score ed. W. T. Best, pub. London: Novello & Co. Ltd. 1879