A Dictionary of Music and Musicians/Rest

REST (Fr. Silence, Pause; Ger. Pause; Ital. Pausa). The sign of silence in music, the duration of the silence depending upon the form of the character employed to denote it. The employment of the rest dates from the invention of 'measured music,' that is, music composed of notes of definite and proportionate values. [See Musica Mensurata; Notation, p. 470.] In earlier times the cantus was sung without pauses, or with only such slight breaks as were necessary for the due separation of the sentences of the text, but so soon as the relative duration of the notes was established, the employment of rests of like proportionate values became a necessity. Franchinus Gafurius, in his 'Practica Musicæ' (1496), says that the Rest 'was invented to give a necessary relief to the voice, and a sweetness to the melody; for as a preacher of the divine word, or an orator in his discourse, finds it necessary oftentimes to relieve his auditors by the recital of some pleasantry, thereby to make them more favourable and attentive, so a singer, intermixing certain pauses with his notes, engages the attention of his hearers to the remaining parts of his song.' (Hawkins, 'Hist. of Music,' chap. 63.) Accordingly we find rests corresponding in value to each of the notes then in use, as shown in the following table.

Maxima. Longa. Brevis. Semibrevis.

Maxima. Longa perfecta. Longa imperfecta. Pausa. Semipausa.

Minima. Semiminima. Fusa. Semifusa.

Suspirium. Semisuspirium. Pausa Fusæ. Pausa Semifusæ. Of these rests, two, the semipausa and suspirium, have remained in use until the present day, and appear, slightly increased in size but of unchanged value, as the semibreve and minim rests. Two of the longer rests are also occasionally used in modern music, the pausa, or breve rest, to express a silence of two bars' duration, and the longa imperfecta a silence of four. These rests are called in French bâtons, and are spoken of as 'bâton à deux mesures,' 'à quatre mesures.'

The rests employed in modern music, with their names and values in corresponding notes, are shown in the table below.^[1]

English.	French.	German.	Italian.
(a) Semibreve rest.	(a) Pause.	(a) Taktpause.	(a) Pausa della Semibreve.
(b) Minim rest.	(b) Demi-pause.	(b) Halbe Pause.	(a) Pausa della Minima.
(c) Crotchet rest.	(c) Soupir.	(c) Viertelpause.	(c) Pausa della Semiminima, or Quarto.
(d) Quaver rest.	(d) Demi-soupir.	(d) Achtelpause.	(d) Pausa della Croma, or Mezzo Quarto.
(e) Semiquaver rest.	(e) Quart-de-soupir.	(e) Sechszentelpause.	(e) Pausa della Semicroma, or Respiro.
(f) Demisemiquaver rest.	(f) Demi-quart-de-soupir.	(f) Zweiunddreissigstheilpause.	(f) Pausa della Biscroma.
(g) Semidemisemiquaver rest.	(g) Seizième-de-soupir.	(g) Vierundsechszigstehilpause.	(g) Pausa della Semibiscroma.

By a license the semibreve rest is used to express a silence of a full bar in any rhythm (hence the German name Taktpause); its value is therefore not invariable, as is the case with all the other rests, for it may be shorter than its corresponding note, as when used to express a bar of 2–4 or 6–8 time, or longer, as when it occurs in 3-2 time. To express a rest of longer duration than one bar, either the bâtons of two or four bars are employed (Ex. a), or, more commonly, a thick horizontal line is drawn in the stave, and the number of bars which have to be counted in silence is written above it (Ex. b).

Like the notes, the value of a rest can be increased by the addition of a dot, and to the same extent, thus • is equal to , to , and so on.

In the earlier forms of the ancient 'measured music' rests were used as a part of the timesignature, and placed immediately after the clef. In this position they did not denote silence, but merely indicated the description of Mode to be counted. [See Notation, Mode, Time, Signature.]

[ F. T. ]

1. The German form of the crotchet rest differs from the English, being usually written thus . Rousseau also gives Italian forms of the semiquaver and demisemiquaver rests, thus (Music characters) and (Music characters); these are however not common.