Menuet series 2-5 (Menuets by Rameau)

This sampling of named menuets by Jean Philippe Rameau includes two menuet-trio pairs each from the operas Hippolyte (1733) and Les Indes Galantes (1735), plus one menuet-trio from the keyboard works, for a total of ten pieces. As with Couperin, a substantial number of other pieces in the keyboard works are undoubtedly menuets but are given other, non-dance titles.

For the first strains of each of the ten items:

Hippolyte_menuet 1: sentence
Hippolyte_menuet 1 trio:  antecedent + continuation
Hippolyte_menuet 2: period?
Hippolyte_menuet 2 trio: 16 bar period (8-bar antecedent = antecedent + continuation)
Les_Indes_Galantes-menuet 1: period
Les_Indes_Galantes-menuet 1 trio: antecedent + continuation
Les_Indes_Galantes-menuet 2: sentence with contrasting phrase
Les_Indes_Galantes-menuet 2 trio: antecedent + continuation with HC
Pieces_troisieme_recueil_menuet: 16 bar period (antecedent is antecedent + continuation)
Pieces_troisieme_recueil_menuet trio:  16 bar period (antecedent is antecedent + continuation)

The same information by theme type:

Period:  Les_Indes_Galantes-menuet 1
  Hippolyte_menuet 2
Sentence:   Hippolyte_menuet 1
  Les_Indes_Galantes-menuet 2
Antecedent + continuation:  Hippolyte_menuet 1 trio
  Les_Indes_Galantes-menuet 1 trio
  Les_Indes_Galantes-menuet 2 trio
16-bar period, where 8-bar antecedent = antecedent + continuation:
  Hippolyte_menuet 2 trio
  Pieces_troisieme_recueil_menuet
  Pieces_troisieme_recueil_menuet trio

Here are examples, first strains only, in the order of the list by theme type above. In some of the examples, note the use of the French violin clef.

Period:
Les_Indes_Galantes-menuet 1. A textbook period, except for the ending on V.

Hippolyte_menuet 2. One might be tempted to call this a sentence if one followed the up-and-down meandering of the opening rhythmic figure, but it seems clear that contrast is the goal in the first phrase (note the orchestration) and in any case the upper voice in bars 3-4 is a common melodic cliché of the menuet. Equally, bars 5-6 are meant to recall the beginning, even if the pitches are flipped.

Sentence:
Hippolyte_menuet 1. The continuation is more contrast than development, though one could, I suppose, point to the flipped rhythms (bar 5 = bar 2; bar 6 = bar 1).

Les_Indes_Galantes-menuet 2. The first phrase is very close in design to the first phrase of the preceding example. The second phrase is contrasting, though it does use fragmentation (that is, one-bar elements).

Antecedent + continuation:
Hippolyte_menuet 1 trio. Here again, the continuation is really a contrasting phrase with fragmentation.

Les_Indes_Galantes-menuet 1 trio. The antecedent+continuation theme can achieve maximum contrast, as it does here, in aid of instrumentation and dynamic contrasts.

Les_Indes_Galantes-menuet 2 trio. Every two-bar idea is different.

16-bar period, where 8-bar antecedent = antecedent + continuation:
In all three examples below, the overall period design is very clear. In the eight-bar antecedent, its own antecedent phrase (bars 1-4) is what I call a "weak antecedent" (contrasting ideas but no cadence), or what Caplin calls a "compound basic idea."

Hippolyte_menuet 2 trio.

Pieces_troisieme_recueil_menuet

Pieces_troisieme_recueil_menuet trio