Rests
Just like the notes, the rest symbols already had the same shapes that were later to develop into the modern symbols (with the smaller values being successively introduced in the course of the period of Mensural notation). Unlike the notes themselves, rests had a fixed, invariable duration and could not be perfected, imperfected or alterated; however, they could in turn induce imperfection on a neighbouring larger note. For longa rests, there were two separate forms for the perfect (triplex) and for the imperfect (duplex) longa. As a consequence of their invariant duration, a sequence of rests could be used as an indication of the prevailing meter of a composition (in the absence of modern bar notation). This is often found at the beginning of the tenor voice of a composition.
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Famous quotes containing the word rests:
“Physical force has no value, where there is nothing else. Snow in snow-banks, fire in volcanoes and solfataras is cheap. The luxury of ice is in tropical countries, and midsummer days. The luxury of fire is, to have a little on our hearth; and of electricity, not the volleys of the charged cloud, but the manageable stream on the battery-wires. So of spirit, or energy; the rests or remains of it in the civil and moral man, are worth all the cannibals in the Pacific.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“I have given the best of myself and the best work of my life to help obtain political freedom for women, knowing that upon this rests the hope not only of the freedom of men but of the onward civilization of the world.”
—Mary S. Anthony (1827–1907)
“An entertainment is something which distracts us or diverts us from the routine of daily life. It makes us for the time being forget our cares and worries; it interrupts our conscious thoughts and habits, rests our nerves and minds, though it may incidentally exhaust our bodies. Art, on the other hand, though it may divert us from the normal routine of our existence, causes us in some way or other to become conscious of that existence.”
—Sir Herbert Read (1893–1968)