Marcato il canto

As Printed on a Score

Printed beside the melody it refers to, often in piano music where the tune is embedded in figuration, alone or in a phrase (dolce ma sempre marcato il canto); it lasts while that melody continues.

How Composers Use It

Marcato here means brought out more than accented: give the melody notes more weight than the texture around them so the line projects. Combined with dolce, it shows that the two can coexist — a soft passage with a clearly projected tune. Mark the melody notes with accents, tenuto lines or separate stems so the player knows exactly which notes are meant.

Example

Liszt, Transcendental Étude No. 9 (“Ricordanza”), m. 36: “dolce ma sempre marcato il canto.” — sweet, but always with the melody marked.

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