J. S. BACH Jonathan Berkahn - Victoria University - Victoria ...

Haydn would write only one more fugue for string quartet, the finale to
op.50/4, in 1787. Separated from its cousins by fifteen years, it shows a number of
significant differences. The subject—perhaps the only one by Haydn to approach J. S.
Bach in melodic individuality—is a gigue-fugue like that of op.20/2, but there is very
little levity to be found here. Much of the subject’s distinctiveness in fact derives from
the combination of its dance-like metre with the ‘pathetic’ diminished-seventh
(Ex.3.16). Tovey responded strongly to this pathos: ‘quietest and deepest of all the ...
instrumental fugues since Bach, [it] strikes a note so tragic that Beethoven’s C sharp
minor quartet is the first thing one can connect it with.’ 36
Although any similarity to Gassmann’s (or indeed Haydn’s own) easy-going
sonata/fugues is only superficial, thematically, an unmistakable sonata element has
36 ‘Haydn’s chamber music’, in Essays and lectures on music (London: Oxford University Press,
1949), p.61.
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