neighbor note

noun

variants or less commonly neighbor tone or neighboring tone or neighboring note

: a nonharmonic note that is approached stepwise from above or below and returns to the previous note

Within this motive and elsewhere in the movement, the semitone neighbor note will prove to be the most consequential motivic cell …

—Stephen E. Hefling, ed., Nineteenth-Century Chamber Music, 1998

called also (chiefly British) auxiliary note, auxiliary tone

see counterpoint illustration

neighbor-note adjective

Word History

First Known Use

1900, in the meaning defined above

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