Do note lengths matter when they have l.v. ties?

Question

This is pretty esoteric, but I have to ask: Consider the following excerpt from a score (“Titanic Suite” by James Horner, published by Hal Leonard), which includes two percussion staves, one with a mark tree glissando and one with a chime hit, both ending with laissez vibrer (l.v.) ties:

Note how the mark tree glissando ends on a quarter-note, whereas the chimes note is a whole note. Similarly, l.v. ties are added to both quarter (or shorter) and whole notes throughout the score.

My question: Is there any particular rule or convention that says whether to use a shorter or longer note when using an l.v. tie? For instance, in the above example, why not use a whole note for the mark tree note? Does note length matter if they’re both using l.v. ties? Is it instrument-dependent? Or is it all purely stylistic?

Answer 1

I think it’s mostly instrument dependent, and the excerpt you’ve given makes sense to me. I think the primary difference lies in how sustained notes are performed on the instrument in question; let’s start with a more obvious example.

If we had a part for cello, there would be a big difference between a whole note with l.v. mark and a quarter note. The whole note would mean that you continue bowing for four beats, the lv would just be an indication not to dampen the note once the fourth beat was done. With a quarter note, I would only play a single beat—depending on tempo, potentially just the initial attack—and then let the string vibrate. Now imagine it was a pizzicato cello part: the difference is suddenly pretty much meaningless, because the performer doesn’t do anything after the initial attack. That means that either a quarter or a whole note would have essentially the same effect, so the choice is less significant. For my money, the quarter note would potentially have sharper or shorter implications, but it’s a subtle distinction that probably doesn’t matter too much.

Now we come to your specific example, which I agree is less clear-cut. I think that if the mark tree used a whole note there would be some ambiguity about either whether the performer should continue raking up and down the instrument or whether the single raking motion should be slow enough to last for four additional beats. The sustain period of a mark tree, in other words, includes continued performance by the player. The chime is like the pizzicato cello above, the player does nothing else after the initial attack. Again, I think that using a quarter note here would be slightly less optimal since it would tend to emphasize rests and silence in a way that might make the l.v. part seem like it should be more of an afterthought, but you’re right that 98% of the time it wouldn’t make much difference. I think the default is just to go for the simplest notation, and quarter note–quarter rest–half rest is unnecessarily complicated compared to a single whole note.

If all else is equal (which is true for pizzicato cello and chimes, but not for arco cello and mark tree), go for simple and sustained-looking.