A pause is easy to mistake for an absence. In a group performance it can be a signal: one player leaves an opening and another decides whether to enter. The silence has shape because everyone in the room knows it could end at any moment.
Listen to how a drummer handles a gap in the melody. Sometimes a small accent holds the form together. Sometimes the drummer stays out of the way and lets the next phrase arrive on its own. The choice changes the feeling of the whole passage.
This is one reason we return to recordings rather than only remembering the tune. The notes make a map; the pauses show how the players traveled through it together.