Rehearsed a rest today — the silence that carries the phrase

We spent the morning on the fermata before the recapitulation in the slow movement. Not the notes — the space. Conducting a rest is like holding water in your hands: too tight and it slips, too loose and it's gone. The second clarinet finally relaxed into it and the whole phrase breathed for the first time in six weeks. Nobody clapped. That was the point.