Menuet

As Printed on a Score

Printed as a movement title — Menuet, Menuet I and Menuet II, Menuet et Trio — sometimes with a tempo; at the end of the trio a direction such as Menuet da capo or D.C. sends players back to the minuet, traditionally without its repeats.

How Composers Use It

Menuet is the French spelling of French Baroque suites and of later French composers looking back to them; Bach kept it in his keyboard suites, Debussy and Ravel revived it. It promises a stately triple metre with a light first beat, two-bar groupings and balanced phrases, usually paired with a second minuet or trio. Give a tempo as well: a Baroque menuet and a Classical menuetto move quite differently.

Example

Debussy, Suite bergamasque, second movement: titled “Menuet”, between the Prélude and Clair de lune.

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