Home 1. Introduction 2. Markers 3. Archive 4. Audible Markers 5. Visible Markers 6. Notational Markers 7. Conclusion
3.1. Integrated Silences 3.2. Inherent Silences 3.3. Silent Discourse 3.4. Meta-Silences 3.5. Silencings
Frederick Chopin frequently emphasized yearning and nostalgia, especially in the ending to his ninth Nocturne. The example is entirely unbarred, suggesting the tempo rubato freedoms of a cadenza. The successive pauses seem to summon longing, yearning, nostalgia, surprise, anguish, despair, or regret. This intense compression of emotions into a few rests is made possible by the complexity of the note passages in between and the tensions already set up in the exposition. In this fragment, the note passages between the silences are characterized by chromaticism, anticipation, or suspension in the melodic runs and unstable chords. Each rest is inextricably linked to the notes around it, in a context of tension and release. This type of freely rubato writing contrasts with the regularity of the preceding three pages, but is certainly characteristic of Chopin, as in his Impromptus. In the quoted example, the right hand suggests the melodic potential of a violin, complete with pauses for upbows; it could equally well be reminiscent of an oboe or clarinet, with quick passages punctuated by pauses for breath. The pauses “speak” along with the notes. Unlike examples in 20th-century music, these silences do not seem to have their own tangibility. Whatever instrument is evoked here needs breath-like pauses, and the pauses contain a directionality as they lead fluidly, and in rubato timing, to the next melodic flourish.
Figure 1: excerpt from the ending of the ninth nocturne (Polskie Wydawnictwo Muzyczne: 1965)
The first rest on the last line might imply a function of drawing out, pulling or extending. The last rest creeps in with finality, announcing the end of the composition. American novelist Amor Towles writes of a (fictional) performance of the ending of this nocturne:
Whatever personal sense of heartache Chopin had hoped to express through this little composition—whether it had been prompted by a loss of love, or simply the sweet anguish one feels when witnessing a mist on a meadow in the morning—it was right there […] one hundred years after the composer’s death. (Towles, 2016, p. 326)
Each rest offers evidence for the multidimensionality of performed silence. The rests seem to function as pregnant silence, anticipatory silence, surprise silence, and breathing. The first two fermata rests in the example above imply a beat and are almost accented in their performance. The results could describe heartache, loss or sweet anguish. But they also serve a breathing, interrupting function, a catching of breath in the melody.
A pianist might choose to embody this catch in several ways. One option is to focus on the relaxation of tension in a reaction against the sudden G7° chord that has preceded the rest. Another embodiment might be more of a visual bounce with the hands, emphasizing the accentuation of the rest. So the rests could be interpreted as drawing the line through, pulling Chopin’s gradual melodic ascension upwards. Or rather focusing on the interruptions, on the thwarting of expectations, which also characterizes the melodic ascent. Other interpretations are just as possible, for example, one in which the pedal is held down to reinforce the dissonance of the minor 7th interval (G to E#). In this case, gestures would still be possible but might be embodied in a more drawn-out or languorous manner.
Each of Chopin’s silences in this coda seems to summon a different type of nostalgia, knotting and weaving the phrases together. Similarly, the silences seem anticipated and prepared by the notes.