Are whole notes/rests really used to signify variable lengths of time?
I saw this answer and I thought the guy was absolutely crazy for assuming that a whole note automatically equaled one measure regardless of time signature. However, there does appear to be more than one person who believes this. On a comment to this question, Matthew Read states:
Personally I would use a whole rest, which ought to be understood thanks to the fact that it is already variable (used to represent the length of a bar irrespective of the time signature in most cases), but I don't think that's common practice.
Now my biggest issue with this idea stems more from a logical standpoint than a musical standpoint since most of the other notes/rests are defined as a fraction of the whole note. For example, the half note is generally defined as:
noun, Music.
1.
a note equivalent in time value to one half of a whole note; minim. Dictionary.com
a musical note equal in time to half of a whole note merriam-webster
In music, a half note (American) or minim (British) is a note played for half the duration of a whole note (or semibreve) and twice the duration of a quarter note (or crotchet). Wikipedia
Now for example in 2/4 time that would somehow make all of the following true:
The half note is equal to a full measure
The whole note is equal to a full measure
The half note is equal to 1/2 of the whole note (even though they are both equal to a full measure).
So my question is: Is the whole note/rest really used as a note of variable length? If so, how common of a practice is it and how could this possibly be justified?
NOTE: I specifically mention notes in the question, but I am asking about the standpoint on both notes and rests since I normally think of individual rests as having a specific note that they are equal to in terms of length (if this is an incorrect way of thinking please correct me).
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This is a very common misconception due to how the notes are named. All notes take up a very specific length of a measure as defined by the time signature.
In the most common time signature 4/4, which is also refereed to as common time, a whole note and rest both take the value of 4 quarter notes so it takes up the whole measure in 4/4. The half note and rest both take the value of 2 quarter notes so it takes up half of the measure.The quarter note take the value of 1 quarter note and rest both so it takes up a quarter of the measure. This pattern continues in both directions as there are even values bigger then a whole note like the double whole note shown below.
So the naming scheme is build around 4/4 and it works perfectly there and makes sense, however when using it with other time signatures conceptual problems can arise and informally people will use a whole note rest for a whole measure. Just looking at the measure you can tell that you rest for the whole measure, but theoretically it is incorrect and should be avoided.
The other answers are using terminology which common, but confusing. I think it's better to realize there are two different things here.
A whole-bar rest. This is always the same symbol whatever the length of the bar, and it is always positioned horizontally in the middle of the bar.
A whole-note rest. This has the same length as a whole-note. and is positioned horizontally in the same place as the note would be written, just like any other rest.
The apparent confusion comes from the fact that both 1 and 2 use the same symbol (but written in different places horizontally), and also that whole-note rests are very rare, because the only "common" time signatures where a bar is longer than a whole note are 3/2 and 4/2, and those have not been used much since about 1800.
Really, this is no more confusing that writing a dot after a note to add a half to its duration, and writing a dot above or below a note to shorten it (staccato). The same symbol means different things, depending on where it is written.
Semibreve rest symbols centered in a bar are commonly used as whole-bar rest. The equivalent of bordun notes that fill a bar with syllables in comparatively free meter (Monteverdi's Vespers contains quite a few prominent examples) is also notated in mid-bar but uses a brevis note (a double whole note), not a semibrevis (whole note). This kind of notation has gone out of fashion since, so the discrepancy between whole bar rests and whole bar notes in their choice of symbol is rare to encounter these days.
Semibreve (whole note) rests are always used as measure rests, except occasionally for time signatures like 4/2, where a breve rest might be used instead. It's actually pretty simple: you know how many beats are in a given measure, so getting finicky about the actual time interval is a bit of a waste of energy when that voice isn't playing anything anyway. In most cases, a semibreve is greater than or equal to an entire measure, so a semibreve rest tells you quite succinctly that you've got an empty measure.
I would not use a semibreve rest to complete a measure - Matthew's comment that it might not be common practice is entirely correct. The rests that fill out the rest of the measure need to fill it exactly. In situations (like 4/2) where a semibreve is a division of the measure, semibreve rests will then be used according to their exact metric value.
I might add that this really is the conventional notation, and has been for centuries now.
Edit: you will not fill a measure with a semibreve note, however, except where the metre warrants it, i.e., 4/4, 2/2. If you have a note that holds for an entire measure of 3/4, for instance, you will use a dotted minim (half note). It is only for measure rests that the semibreve value carries the extra signification.
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