Part II

iii. Rhythm and Time

The whole of the orchestral score for Verblendungen (with two brief exceptions, one near the start, the other at the very end), is written at a constant q =60 (=1") tempo. The attack sequence which dominates the opening sections of the piece is governed by this pulse, always occurring upon it, as do a large number of the upbeats associated with this sequence. Despite this, there is little or no real sense of a regular pulse during these sections, due to the apparently irregular patterning of the attack sequence itself (which range between 3 and 18 seconds apart), and also because this main pulse is never consistently sub-divided, once again giving a sense of irregularity. The changing bar lengths indicated within the orchestral score, similarly, do not reveal any obvious organisation.
At the very opening of the piece, during the initial 3 seconds, the first gesture consists of two attacks which have a 'short-long' (x w ) rhythmic profile (the second attack is provided by the tape only). This attack pattern is echoed at a larger structural level as identified as the first grouping in the level 2 segmentation, now lasting 12 seconds in total (3"+9") It is this gesture, and in particular the grouping together of the two attacks and the time between them, which forms the audible rhythmic structure of the opening minutes of the piece. The three second distance between the attacks within this gesture is near to the limits of rhythmic perception (the slowest tempi commonly encountered in contemporary music not going below e/q = 40, which gives a beat of 1.5 seconds,  double  this 3 second unit).  However, with no internal detail or subdivision between these attacks (marked bybass drum) we are given nothing else to give us a sense of rhythm or time passing.  Further, this three second 'pulse' is repeated several times within the first 27" of the piece(1)  (see figure 11) and establishes itself as the basic time unit at the opening

Three Second Time Unit at Opening of Verblendungen.
Figure 11

Not all the attacks which are present throughout the opening minutes of the piece are close enough to each other to allow easy grouping together into pairs, as occurs at the start. The patterning of the groupings which these attacks fall into is revealed by the level 2 segmentation, which identifies the following structure when the time distance between attacks is plotted:

The left-most column shows those attacks which can be grouped together in pairs and which form the onset or continuants of this structural level. The step-wise increase in length shown by these time values may account in part for the general sense of slowing down which is perceptible in the opening minutes of the piece, at least from a gestural viewpoint. This process is reinforced by the increasing time distance and the (also step-wise) increase in the number of sections between the grouped pairs of attacks themselves.
The process of gestural slowing down identified here continues after the pointidentified at the end of figure 9, as can be seen in the remaining time distances between attacks and particularly the continuation of the incremental sequence (3", 4", 5", 6") previously identified:
18" 11" 18" 7" 8" 9" 24"...
By the start of this sequence, however, the attack gestures have become less dominant and weakened in force, especially after the bass drum drops out after 1' 52". The remaining attacks are chiefly made up material type 2 (on tape), and no longer articulate the level 2 segmentation.
The obvious shift away from gestural to textural music which occurs through the first five minutes of the work can be seen to be initiated right at the start of the piece as the three-second unit of time which is established at the very opening is incrementally increased. The attacks which dominate the opening slow down and diminish in volume and force, giving way to more streamed material (in the orchestra) which is without obvious vertical demarcations. At the same time as this is occurring, the sense of small-scale rhythm provided by the attack sequence at the opening and which is gradually given up as identified, is replaced to some degree, by material type 5b; this gradually becomes more rhythmically profiled, developing into a series of noise pulses after 1' 33", which can clearly be seen on the sonogram.

(1) In one of the recordings used for this study (Saraste, 1989), there is a clear emphasis given by the upper brass, six seconds from the start, which would mark the second 3" unit. This is not indicated in the orchestral score however, and is not as clearly audible in the other recording (Salonen 1984).