CADENCE, in music, according to the ancients, is a series of a certain number of notes, in a certain interval, which strike the ear agreeably, and especially at the end of the song, stanza, &c. It consists ordinarily of three notes.
Cadence, in the modern music, may be defined a certain conclusion of a song, or of the parts of a song, which divide it, as it were, into so many numbers or periods. It is when the parts terminate in a chord or note, the ear seeming naturally to expect it; and is much the same in a song, as the period that closes the sense in a paragraph of a discourse.
A cadence is either perfect, consisting of two notes sung after each other, or by degrees conjoined in each of the two parts, and by these means satisfying the ear; or imperfect, when its last measure is not in the octave or unison, but a sixth or third. It is called imperfect, because the ear doth not acquiesce in the conclusion, but expects a continuation of the song. The cadence is said to be broken, when the bass, instead of falling a fifth, as the ear expects, rises a second, either major or minor. Every cadence is in two measures; sometimes it is suspended, in which case it is called a repose, and only consists of one measure, as when the two parts stop at the fifth, without finishing the cadence. With regard to the bass-viol, Mr Rousseau distinguishes two cadences, one with a rest, when the finger, that should shake the cadence, stops a little, before it shakes, on the note immediately above that which requires the cadence; and one without a rest, when the stop is omitted.