Minuet

From Young Composers

The Minuet (Menuet, French; Menuetto, Italian; Menuett, German) is a dance popular in the 17th and 18th Centuries (1600s & 1700s), of French origin. It is in a stately (not too fast) 3/4 metre, and is characterised by relatively slow and graceful movements. Like most other dances of the time, it is also danced in what is called "open position," meaning that the couples do not dance holding each other face to face. Though danced everywhere in the Western world, it became one of the most important dances in high society and royal and noble courts, and in such settings became very elaborate.

Though still danced as a folk dance in some places, the minuet went out of fashion about 1820, replaced by the waltz and other dances.

In concert music

The minuet came to be used in other ways besides for dancing; In the second half of the 18th Century, it started to be used as a movement in symphonies, and in that context the tempo of it got livelier and the musical form expanded from binary to ternary form. By about 1800, composers such as Beethoven had turned the Minuet or Menuetto into a fast scherzo movement in symphonies and other works.