APPOGGIATURA (from Ital. appoggiare, to lean upon)  , a musical term for a melodic ornament, a grace-note prefixed to a principal note and printed in small character . The effect is to suspend the principal note, by taking away the time-value of the appoggiatura prefixed to it . There are two kinds, the long appoggiatura, now usually printed as played, and the short, where the suspension of the principal note is scarcely perceptible; this is often called acciatura, a word properly applied to an ornament now obsolete, in which a principal note in a melody is struck together with the note immediately below, the lower note being at once released and the other held on .