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In music, a caesura denotes a brief, silent pause, during which metrical time is not counted. Similar to a silent fermata, caesurae are located between notes or measures (before or over bar lines), rather than on notes or rests (as with a fermata). A fermata may be placed over a caesura to indicate a longer pause.
Aug 21, 2023 · In music, a caesura is a silent pause somewhere in the middle of a piece, akin to a rest. This pause is usually placed at a point where it won't interrupt the rhythmic flow, but instead, enhances it. It's like taking a breath before the next note hits, giving listeners a moment to process the musical journey they're on.
Caesura, in modern prosody, a pause within a poetic line that breaks the regularity of the metrical pattern. It is represented in scansion by the sign ‖. The caesura sometimes is used to emphasize the formal metrical construction of a line, but it more often introduces the cadence of natural speech.
- The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
Mar 1, 2010 · There are different types of caesuras available in Dorico Pro. All caesuras indicate a break in sound, but different types are often needed for different styles of musical scores.
- I. What Is A caesura?
- III. Examples of Caesura
- III. Types of Caesura
- IV. The Importance of Caesura
- V. Examples of Caesura in Literature
- VI. Examples of Caesura in Pop Culture
- VII. Related Terms
Caesura (pronouced see-ZOO-ra) refers to a break or pause in the middle of a line of verse. It can be marked as || in the middle of the line, although generally it is not marked at all – it’s simply part of the way the reader or singer pronounces the line. In this article, we’ll include the || mark for the sake of clarity. The plural of “caesura” i...
Example 1
The lyrics to “The Star-Spangled Banner” contain many caesurae, including the opening line: “Oh, say can you see || by the dawn’s early light…”
Example 2
Children’s rhymesoften have caesurae as well, for example in the rhyme “Song of Sixpence,” which contains the line “Four and twenty blackbirds, || baked in a pie.”
Example 3
To be or not to be, || that is the question(William Shakespeare, “Hamlet”) Nearly every performance of this line includes a caesura after the comma. Some actors might choose to read the line straight through with no pause, but it might sound a bit odd – try it out loud and see what the line sounds like without a caesura.
Caesurae are categorized based on where they appear in the line. Thus, there are three types: 1. Initial Caesura: this is when the pause appears at or near the beginning of the line. 2. Medial Caesura: the most common type of caesura, this is a pause in the middle of the line. Most of the examples in this article are medial caesura. 3. Terminal Cae...
In many classical meters, caesura was a requirement of certain lines. Latin, Greek, and Anglo-Saxon poets were required to place caesurae in the middle of certain lines. Beowulf, the famous Anglo-Saxon epic poem, has a caesura in each of its lines. (Unfortunately, the English translations don’t preserve these caesurae very well.) Modern forms are m...
Example 1
The mud and leaves in the mauled lane smelled sweet, like blood. || Birds had died or flown… (Vernon Scannell, “Walking Wounded”) This couplet from the first stanza of Scannell’s famous poem contains both enjambment and a caesura. The first line flows into the second with the line break coming in the middle of the sentence – that’s the enjambment. And in the second line, the period causes the reader to pause for a moment, creating a caesura.
Example 2
Alexander Pope’s first major poem, “An Essay on Criticism,” contains one of the most famous caesurae in all of English literature: to err is human; || to forgive, divine.
Example 1
The microphone explodes, || shattering the mold. This lyric, the opening line of Rage Against the Machine’s “Bulls on Parade” contains a pronounced caesura right in the middle. As recorded, there’s a long pause in between “explodes” and “shattering.”
Example 2
Lord forgive him, || he got them dark forces in him(Jay-Z) This caesura straddles the line between initial and medial – it’s certainly not right in the middle of the line, but it’s a long way from the beginning of the line as well.
Enjambment
Enjambment is almost like the opposite of caesura – rather than a pause within a single line, it’s when two lines run together without a pause or a break in meaning. In other words, it’s when a sentence carries on right through the line break. In these cases, readers are expected not to pause at the end of the line, but rather to continue reading straight through to the end of the sentence.
The meaning of CAESURA is a usually rhetorical break in the flow of sound in the middle of a line of verse. How to use caesura in a sentence. Did you know?
May 23, 2024 · A caesura is a pause that occurs in musical or poetical composition. A caesural pause in a line of poetry is dictated by normal speech rhythm, rather than meter. Additionally, a pause in conversation or a pause in music can each be referred to as a caesura.
