SCHERZO (Italian for "a joke") ; in music, a quick move ment evolved from the minuet and used in the position thereof in the sonata forms (q.v.). The term is also used as a mere character name. Haydn first used it and its adverb scherzando, for the middle movement of an early sonata in C sharp minor, and afterwards in place of the minuet in the set of six quartets known sometimes as "Gli Scherzi," and sometimes as the "Russian quartets" (op. 33). He never used the term again, though his later minuets are often in a very rapid tempo and sometimes on a larger scale than any of the earlier scherzos of Beethoven. Haydn wished to see the minuet made more worthy of its position in large sonata works ; but he did not live to appreciate (though he might possibly have heard) the fully-developed scherzos of his pupil, Beethoven.
The formal essence of the minuet and trio lies in their com bination of melodic forms with an exact da capo of the minuet after the trio. No other movement in the sonata has leisure for so purely decorative a symmetry. Beethoven's typical scherzos purposely exaggerate this quality. He does not follow Mozart's example of minuets with two trios, for the style of his mature scherzos is so continuous that a second trio would give it an elaborate rondo character unlike that of a dance-movement. But after Beethoven's scherzo has run through the stages of scherzo, trio and scherzo da capo, it goes through the same trio and da capo again; and then tries to do so a third time, as if it could not find a way out, so that it has to be abruptly stopped. Modern players and listeners are impatient of these grotesque repetitions; but the art-form is true to its own nature, and we should be the better for leisure to understand it. Apart from the wonderful little A flat bagatelle—No. 7 of the set written at the age of 15 and published (presumably with extensive revision) as op. 33—Beethoven first used the double repetition in his 4th symphony (with a shortening of the last da capo) ; and his last example is in the C sharp minor quartet (op. 131).
The scherzo of the 9th symphony is so enormous that its main body differs from a complete first movement of a sonata only in its uniformity of texture and its incessant onrush, which not even the startling measured pauses and the changes from 4-bar to 3-bar rhythm can really interrupt. Beethoven directs as many repeti
tions of its subsections as possible, and his coda consists of an attempt to begin the trio again, dramatically cut short. The scherzo of the C minor symphony was originally meant to go twice round; and a certain pair of superfluous bars, which caused controversy for 3o years after Beethoven's death, were due simply to traces of the difference between the prima volta and seconda volta being left in the score.
Beethoven does not use the title of scherzo unless the music is humorous. Thus in the sonata in E flat (op. 31, No. 3) it is applied to a sonata-form lively movement which is technically the slow movement, while the following slow minuet is the dance movement. The second movement of the F major quartet (op. 59, No. 1) is a unique example of scherzo-style in a most elaborate sonata-f orm.
Perhaps this gigantic movement may have been the inspiring source of the Mendelssohnian scherzo, one of the most distinct new types of movement since Beethoven, and quite independent of the notion of an alternating trio. The scherzos in Men delssohn's Midsummer Night's Dream music, in the Scotch sym phony and in the string quartets in E minor and E flat major (op. 44, Nos. 2 and 3) are splendid examples. Even Berlioz shows their influence in the "Queen Mab" scherzo of his Romeo et Juliette.
Of Brahms' scherzos there are several distinct types, ranging from a quiet allegretto and trio in melodic forms to the sonata form Presto giocoso of the 4th symphony, which within seven minutes accomplishes the most powerful scherzo since Beethoven. Every degree of lyric beauty and dramatic passion is comprised in the various movements that Brahms puts into the position of scherzo in his sonata works.
Chopin produced a new type of independent scherzo ; obviously inspired by Beethoven, but with a slightly macabre tendency of his own, except in the very diffuse and light 4th scherzo. The majority of classical scherzos are in a quick triple time with only one countable beat to a bar; and this custom is the last vestige of the derivation of the scherzo from the minuet.
Of modern scherzos there is nothing specific to be said; the term still applies to lively intermediate movements in cyclic instrumental works, and is otherwise a mere character-name.
(D. F. T.)