Ioannis
Fulias, “Minuet and
scherzo forms in Joseph Haydn’s whole keyboard repertoire”,
in: Giorgos Sakallieros and Ioannis Fulias (ed.), Purcell,
Händel, Haydn, Mendelssohn:
Four anniversaries (Symposium
proceedings,
Athens, 27-28 November 2009), University Studio Press, Thessaloniki 2011, p.
157-171.
Aim
of this paper is the treat of three subjects, for which the scientific debate so
far can be characterised as superficial or simply non-existent. These are: a)
the presence of minuet and scherzo in Joseph Haydn’s whole keyboard repertoire
(i.e. not only in his keyboard sonatas, but also in his keyboard trios, quartets
and quintet), b) a systematical typology of minuet forms, and c) the possibility
of a structural – and not stylistic – distinction between scherzo and minuet.
Therefore, as far as minuet forms is concerned, eight different types are here
distinguished, four ternary and four binary, whose first section ends with an
authentic or a half cadence, or else modulates in a secondary key and – in
this case – the “sonata principle” does apply or not in the last available
section. Furthermore, scherzo form can be described as a ternary sonata-like
structure, whose (relatively huge) third section – unlike what happens in the
ternary sonata-like minuet form – either recapitulates the thematic contents
of the (extremely brief) first section interpolating an extensive “secondary
development”, or fundamentally reconstructs the initial thematic material.
© Ioannis
Fulias