(1) (Fr. suspension; Ger. Vorhalt; It. sospensione).
A dissonance configuration in which the dissonant or Non–harmonic note is tied over from the previous beat (where it is consonant) and resolved by step, usually downwards; a suspension whose non-harmonic note resolves upwards is sometimes called a ‘retardation’ (from Lat. retardatio, a term used in the 17th and 18th centuries).
(2) In French Baroque performance practice, the expressive truncation of a note at its beginning, as shown in ex.1 from Couperin’s L’art de toucher le clavecin (Paris, 1717); the remainder of the harmony normally appears in its expected position on the beat, while the exact length of the delay is determined by the performer’s taste. The term ‘demi-soupir’, as well as ‘suspension’, was sometimes applied to this ornament, and the fact that Brossard in his Dictionnaire des termes (Paris, 1701) defined the Italian cognate mezzo-sospiro as a figure (identical with the modern quaver rest) which ‘marks that one is silent for the eighth part of a bar’ suggests that the ornament may originally have been a vocal device.
See also Ornaments §7.
JULIAN RUSHTON