On Beethoven's repeats, I'd like to put in a vote against the one and only
repeat in all of the classical period which I think demonstrably weakens
the work: the finale of Beethoven's 5th.  When the main theme bursts out
of the long darkness and crescendo, it's bright, grand, and triumphant;
when it shows up a second time, it kills all the momentum built up by the
end of the exposition.  I'm strongly in favor of doing all exposition
repeats, but I wish Beethoven had made a different choice there.

Peter Goldstein
Huntingdon, PA