Humanities & Social Sciences 1 (2016 9) 41-54 ~ ~ ~ УДК 78.085 The Genre of the Minuet in the Works of Maurice Ravel Valentina V. Bass* Krasnoyarsk State Institute of Art 22 Lenin Str., Krasnoyarsk, 660049, Russia Received 19.07.2015, received in revised form 21.08.2015, accepted 30.08.2015 The article deals with the key issue of modern musicology, the issue of a certain genre that prevails in the works of a music composer, an ability of a genre to become a factor that determines stylistic specifi city. <...> In the works of Maurice Ravel this style-forming factor is dance. <...> On the example of the minuet that occupies a special place in the works of the composer, the article explores the principles of mediation of choreographic and musical features of the dance prototype at the semantic and structural levels in the thematism and form generation of Ravel’s works. <...> The aesthetic perfection and delicate elegance of gestures, graphical precision of choreographic pattern and dialogueness typical for the minuet have been refl ected in the motive-composition character of the thematism, the periodicity of the syntax, the relative stability of the meter, the active use of various methods of polyphonization of the musical texture, the exclusive role of the principle of symmetry on the compositional, melodic and textural levels of the musical form. <...> Individual features of the minuet in various works of Ravel are related to their stylistic origins and genre fusion creating certain imagery. <...> Keywords: minuet, dance prototype, choreographic pattern of dance, genre semantics, counter rhythm, fi gurative polyphony, stylistic multilayers. <...> The works focused on a particular dance are widely represented in Ravel’s symphonic works, concert and symphonic genres, piano, chamber-instrumental and vocal music. <...> Ravel’s method of implementation of dance in the music is characterized by a desire for © Siberian Federal University. <...> All rights reserved * Corresponding author E-mail address: valentinabass@mail.ru # 41 # Valentina V. Bass. <...> The Genre of the Minuet in the Works of Maurice Ravel multidimensional refl ection. <...> On the other hand, multidimension of the refl ection reveals itself in variability, multiplicity of interpretations of one and the same dance. <...> Using certain techniques of transformation (intensifi cation or attenuation shades of meaning) or conversion (rethinking) of original semantics of some dance prototype, Ravel “expands” its semantic borders. <...> The minuet occupies a special place among ancient dances <...>