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

entered. The material of Ex.3.16 serves both as an orthodox fugue subject and as the
melody of a homophonic ‘second subject’, which is recapitulated in the tonic. Tonally,
the design has almost nothing to do with sonata form. It is, rather, authentically
‘Baroque’ in the sense that it moves coherently from point to point without attempting
to set up any long term goals. The exposition, for example, shifts neatly between F
sharp minor and A (b.11), E (b.14), A (b.16), B minor (b.20), C sharp minor (b.24), F
sharp minor (b.26), A (b.29), C sharp minor (b.31), and E major, in which very odd
key (established only the bar before) the ‘second subject’ is set. Anything less like a
normal sonata key scheme would be difficult to imagine. There is a little more fugal
working, including a stretto, and then the second subject reappears in the tonic and the
fugue ends with an eerily spare coda. As a unique fugue/sonata hybrid it is sui generis.
On the whole Kirkendale appears to feel something of LaRue’s ambivalence
about the Classical fugal style. Throughout his discussion of the general
characteristics of the later eighteenth-century chamber fugue the example of Bach is
present implicitly in the background, and with a few exceptions, the repertoire as a
whole comes across as rather thin and conventional. At one point, however, he makes
an abrupt volte face: ‘This, however [lack of contrapuntal device and independent
voice-leading], should not lead to a generally negative judgement, as might easily
result from the one-sided orientation to J. S. Bach. Rather, it preserves the music from
labored turgidity, makes it more fluent and euphonious, and gives it the lightness and
elegance characteristic of southern Germany and Italy.’ 37 When we criticise Classical
fugues for their clarity and simplicity, is this another example of what Tovey called:
‘discovering the fundamental hypothesis of an art-form and calling it a fatal defect’? 38
The answer depends on the legitimacy and significance of the eighteenth-century
Viennese chamber fugue as a genre in its own right.
37 Kirkendale, Fugue and fugato, p.75.
38 A companion to Beethoven’s pianoforte sonatas (London: ABRSM, 1931), p.4, and many other
places.
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