great composer refers to him in corresponding with Ries in 1818.) The duration of these notes could not have been written otherwise than by means of ties. The above test is therefore inapplicable; this is evidently why, in the edition edited by Potter, they are marked with a tie plus a dot and horizontal stroke (Fig. 6a).
Fig. 6a.
Another indication is the tying of an unaccented note to an accented one, thus obliterating the accent if the tie be observed literally (instances occur in Chopin's Valse, Op. 31, No. I). So much critical judgment, however, is required to distinguish this treatment from that proper to a tie, that composers would do well to adopt some such method as Cipriani Potter's to make their exact meaning clear.
This interpretation of a tie, according to which the notes, since they overlap, are just not separated, must not be confused with the mezzo-staccato touch, also indicated with a slur, but having dots also (in the case of a single note indicated by a stroke with a dot), and which means that the notes are to be just not joined. In legato, of course, they should be neither separated nor overlapping, but exactly contiguous.
