ABSTRACT
The idea that music is graced with poetic content is as old as the mythical history of music itself. Ludwig van Beethoven achieves several things by bringing the Scherzo theme and its transition back specifically during the retransition of his Finale. First, he carries off one of his favourite ploys for making the recapitulation more momentous: he introduces a quieter passage fraught with anticipatory tension. Second, Beethoven prepares the entrance of the Scherzo theme in the Finale in a way that emphatically marks it as the result of a disjunction. Sir George Grove touches on some musical aspects of the recapitulated Scherzo theme that support hearing it as a memory rather than as an actual return. Verbal interpretations thus act as a way of embodying the musical experience of an active listener, a way of making the music into a truth for the listener.
