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Without mute: remove the mute (senza sordini, plural, for a whole section). In early piano music, as in Beethoven’s “Moonlight” Sonata, senza sordini means without dampers — that is, with the sustaining pedal down.
Printed above the staff as senza sordino or senza sord., at the point where mutes come off — usually after a rest — or at the head of a movement that follows a muted one. It lasts until the next con sord.
Abbreviations: senza sord.
Also spelled: senza sordina, Senza sordini
The standard cancellation of a mute. Give players time: a string mute takes a moment to remove, a brass mute several seconds, so place it after a rest or a few bars’ silence. In piano music the plural senza sordini means without dampers, that is, with the sustaining pedal — a different instruction altogether.
Bach, Mass in B minor, “Qui tollis peccata mundi”, violins and viola, m. 1: “senza sordino” — the upper strings had been muted in the preceding “Domine Deus”.
Senza sordino is one of 1755 terms in the Gradus musical dictionary: the words, abbreviations and instrument names that appear in printed scores, plus the vocabulary composers use to talk about them.
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