Beethoven’s five-part scherzos: appearance and reality.

When is a repeat not a repeat? This article examines two areas in which repeats, notated by Classical period composers, are commonly held to be optional, and consequently in practice ignored. In particular, Beethoven’s five-part scherzos often appear in modern editions as scherzo–trio–scherzo with a da capo indicated that may appear optional. In this article all the sources, both manuscript and printed, of all Beethoven’s five-part scherzos, are examined, and the conclusion reached that Beethoven would have assumed that the movement would be written out in full showing clearly and unambiguously its five-part form.The wider picture of minuets and scherzos is then examined, and a similar conclusion shows that the custom nowadays of omitting repeats on the da capo, after the Trio, has no foundation in Classical period performance practice. On the contrary, in all music up to about 1830 it was invariably assumed, and accepted, that after the trio the minuet was played exactly as before, with both its repeats. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]