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

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Beethoven’s Grosse Fuge, op.133, Warren Kirkendale calculates that not more than 45 percent is actually fugal. 25 The opening of Mozart’s overture could be taken as a model for seamless transition between fugal and non-fugal—anti-fugal, even—material. The bustling orchestral continuation (bb.29-) clearly references the second half of the subject and its countersubject and ought to sound contrapuntal, with its dissonances and suspensions. Instead, its self-evident function as an orchestral tutti, and the long-term tonal goal it points toward, overwhelms whatever contrapuntal significance it might have had. Likewise, the cadential theme that arrives when B flat is finally established (b.44) is undeniably contrapuntal, in principle. A loosely imitative dialogue takes place between flute and oboe, while the subject’s head-motive (in thirds) is imitated at the fifth between the bassoons and clarinet. And yet, with its easy swing between tonic and dominant, transparent texture, homophonic ‘oom-pah’ string accompaniment, and large-scale repetition (bb.49-50/51-52, and 49-58/59-68), nothing could be further from the genuinely fugal style of the opening. This transformation of the head-motive’s affect, structural function, and texture each time it recurs (compare bb.1, 38, 42, 44, 49, 88, 98, 113, 129, and 204) perhaps serves as the best indication of the difference between Classical ‘thematic development’ and fugal imitation. A sonata movement’s very existence is predicated upon contrasts—of texture, affect, rhythmic movement, harmonic change, theme—that fugue cannot possibly absorb while remaining fugal. 26 It is worth asking just why the presence of later eighteenth-century material such as periodic cantabile melody, or homophonic orchestral tutti, should disrupt the course of a fugue in a way that earlier non-fugal material—Fortspinnung concerto-like passagework, for example—does not? Part of the answer lies no doubt in what had 25 Fugue and fugato, p.265 26 See pp.186-93 below where Samuel Wesley’s Fugue from a Subject of Mr Salomon attempts to absorb just such contrasts into a generally fugal style. 24
already become the historicising nature of the genre: Classical homophony is out of place in a fugue in the same way that a digital watch is out of place in a historical costume drama—it simply doesn’t fit. This ‘dressing-up’ element (‘Me voilà perruqué’, as Mendelssohn said upon the publication of his op.35 and 37 preludes and fugues) is an important part of post-Baroque attitudes to fugue. But can we find a structural rationale to underpin this instinct? The concerto-like material referred to above may not itself be imitative or contrapuntal, nor even bear any particular relation to the subject; but it flows and evolves in much the same non-periodic, non-repeating way as the counterpoint that surrounds it. It is the periodicity of galant melody that refuses to co-exist with fugue, cutting across the overlapping, freely evolving contrapuntal lines, systematising and coordinating them toward larger goals. The simplest reason the Zauberflöte overture is not a fugue is that it can be better explained in terms of sonata form: in terms, that is, of large-scale repetition coordinated with long-term tonal goals. One of the defining characteristics of fugue thus turns out not to be the presence of certain features, but their absence—it is no wonder theorists have had such difficulty defining the shape of fugue, if part of its raison d’etre is the lack of just this kind of schematic organisation. 27 If the Zauberflöte overture begins as a fugue but loses its fugal identity as it proceeds, Handel’s chorus ‘Blessing, and honour, glory and pow’r’ (Messiah) is an example of the opposite situation. Its ‘exposition’ is so loose as to scarcely deserve the name at all. By Bachian standards the voices enter in a recklessly higgledy- piggledy fashion: tenor and bass in unison in D (b.1), soprano in D (b.5) unaccompanied until tenor re-enters with the tail-end of the subject in close imitation 27 See pp.102-5 where BWV 540 is discussed in terms of Keats’s concept of ‘negative capability’. I should emphasise that this indifference to symmetry is a property of the style itself, not just certain great composers’ transformation of it—of Johann Pachelbel and J. C. F. Fischer and J. G. Walther, not just Bach and Handel. It is also (in my view—pace the objections cited on p.230-1) a property of later successful imitations of the style: most of the fugues of Haydn and Mozart, for example. 25
Page 1 and 2: WRESTLING WITH THE GERMAN DEVIL: FI
Page 3 and 4: ABSTRACT ‘After’ can be taken b
Page 5 and 6: ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS There are many peo
Page 7 and 8: INTRODUCTION ‘Every hearer enjoys
Page 9 and 10: esponse was: ‘the fugue is no lon
Page 11 and 12: instrumental fugues of Joseph Haydn
Page 13 and 14: world of their own. The study concl
Page 15 and 16: facts and the ‘soft technology’
Page 17 and 18: DEFINING FUGUE But what are they? W
Page 19 and 20: elow). For how many voices or parts
Page 21 and 22: indeed a complete counter-expositio
Page 23: on two pitches throughout, tonic an
Page 27 and 28: Catholic tradition, but Albrechtsbe
Page 29 and 30: the texture as a whole coincides in
Page 31 and 32: kind experimentalism of Samuel Wesl
Page 33 and 34: The clearest sign of things to come
Page 35 and 36: Perhaps a clue can be found in the
Page 37 and 38: CHAPTER 1 THE CIRCLE OF J. S. BACH
Page 39 and 40: FINE DISTINCTIONS (1): MISATTRIBUTE
Page 41 and 42: sounding object, nothing has change
Page 43 and 44: Mendelssohn, Schumann, Spitta, Wido
Page 45 and 46: pieces are known from a single copy
Page 47 and 48: very good; and the ends of both mov
Page 49 and 50: ever, could have written it?’ 23
Page 51 and 52: incorrectly prepared suspended four
Page 53 and 54: has a number of doubtful features.
Page 55 and 56: einforces them. Its texture is impo
Page 57 and 58: of thinking over long spans.’ 44
Page 59 and 60: W. F. Bach and Krebs have always en
Page 61 and 62: the equitable distribution of his e
Page 63 and 64: slender volumes, including many pie
Page 65 and 66: In style (there is no particular th
Page 67 and 68: and it is the least comfortable bit
Page 69 and 70: voices inverted, and serve the purp
Page 71 and 72: each line in a polyphonic texture a
Page 73 and 74: If its general type is old, however
Page 75 and 76:
thematic material. The subject coul
Page 77 and 78:
Karl Geiringer makes an almost emba
Page 79 and 80:
prolix F minor fugue, the expressiv
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Kittel, and Krebs himself. 76 Inevi
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[that] a keyboard composer can and
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Ex.1.12b shows the start of a fugue
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Egypt) did not prevent him from bei
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The very slow harmonic rhythm, howe
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If not inimitably characteristic, t
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As we saw in the first part of this
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subject is also expansive; it too c
Page 100 and 101:
to expand and elaborate the surface
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The significance of this sort of st
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By the time the halfway point is re
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‘originality’—of historical p
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to follow in his father’s footste
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CHAPTER 2 J. S. BACH IN LONDON: CON
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of the mark. 4 Handel’s influence
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that would perpetuate his oratorios
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—also remained strongly Handelian
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118
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in the Overture to Alcina (1735). A
Page 122 and 123:
Root-movement is quite unpredictabl
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124
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Superficially they have much in com
Page 128 and 129:
situations; but his influence outla
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130
Page 132 and 133:
ounded too closely by early Methodi
Page 134 and 135:
At first the real focus of attentio
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surprisingly grammatical, confirmin
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138
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the subject (where again he seems n
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in Bath) recommended that Charles
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have, to a head-injury sustained in
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146
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The ending is rather curious: he re
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hectic week, he could choose betwee
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152
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even have had an informal agreement
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Unlike Handel, however, there no tu
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Throughout the nineteenth century t
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Here, however (especially once the
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162
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published separately over the next
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166
Page 168 and 169:
Likewise does the fugue subject of
Page 170 and 171:
A little more Bach can be seen, per
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attitudes were representative, or e
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consciously parodying his Methodist
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his nature to be exclusive about an
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elieve) in German, the compleatly w
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no other way one could hear operas,
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a stretto treatment (at one minim
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have had a rich Treat in chewing th
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admirable Musick might be played in
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At this point one might have expect
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This is soon accompanied by quaver
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The C minor entry in b.50 destabili
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WESLEY’S LAST YEARS During this p
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Wilhelm Friedemann (see chapter 1).
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describes it well: ‘The concertan
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with sixteen-part orchestra’ (Car
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would be of interest to a budding c
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wrestling with the problem of integ
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Clearly, Haydn is letting fugal thi
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By contrast, the fugue which closes
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unknown in any other Haydn fugue (a
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around b.54, homophonic quaver figu
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very little to it, which is of cour
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When Haydn wrote string quartets, t
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place, socially and musically; and
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of the minuet, both here and in man
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The distinction that Kirkendale dre
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variety of keys as well: not just I
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detail. As far as the tastes of Pri
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constructed in an entirely new mann
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Note the extent to which Haydn’s
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A clear example of this can be seen
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Haydn would write only one more fug
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At any rate, the effect of later ei
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appears not wholly to satisfy Kirke
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Junker and others were neither part
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sentimental’ (c.1814?), Haydn’s
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intensity of the debate? This is ho
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is an almost perfect instrument for
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CHAPTER 4 MOZART, FINISHED AND UNFI
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as such—at times even creating th
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thought and practice until very rec
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sonata movement sets up certain exp
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organ music: from the death of J. S
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(to us) the direct influence of J.
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and back without a sign that anythi
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is not necessarily at variance with
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conclusion is not perfectly in acco
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there can be no doubt that Mozart,
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to enclose your letter to me?’ 35
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The Dean was in a state of great ex
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‘passive’ voices; Ex.4.5 shows
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274
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276
Page 278 and 279:
against itself, augmented and inver
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Andante also found favour, but part
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enewed application to this task. Wh
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for a child of twelve. The subject
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These masses mark the two poles of
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After this exposition the cadential
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is a much less dramatic tale, of ca
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happened, on October 26 1783 at Ben
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the voices. There is a single expos
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ascending, descending (or both), st
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298
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(apart from particella for wind and
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up to Mozart’s standard, the melo
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weight than Süssmayr’s say-so. B
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crisis [Lebenskrise] from which, in
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all, please few with counterpoint a
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of much that was excellent’. 3 In
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continually surpass his own creativ
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This ethical approach to music, so
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Like Mozart, Beethoven was a great
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There are a few reasonably complete
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It is, in part, a question of autho
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voice ‘Parthie’, an oboe concer
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although it is in a different key;
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which had such a similar subject (E
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328
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his early life is there a single re
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‘Metaphorically, Beethoven was al
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On the other hand, whilst there is
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of a sort that has if anything tend
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To thus posit ‘lateness’ about
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historical development; 61 all thes
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These critics were not necessarily
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could anyone have expected that Bee
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hear it more often. Well, once more
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development came the flood of ‘mu
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Sometimes, it is just noise, in the
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At times, so eccentric are his text
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eighteenth century; and however muc
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Carpani; from the time he entered E
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His opp.1bis, 5, and 6, however, (p
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360
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nineteenth century—the style of H
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364
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movement. There is no danger of irr
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time, whereas the glory of many a B
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On the other hand, the tonal range
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It is with some surprise that we he
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A canon at the fourth below, ‘we
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Clementi. In this respect the issue
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turns out to be none other than our
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None of these, in any case, remotel
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traditional form.’ 125 Weber expr
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Arioso into the rest of the movemen
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eturned by b.248. On the other hand
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grise, it nevertheless exerts consi
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century fugal writing more satisfac
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CONCLUSION ‘Like most other disci
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from Fux to Haydn to Bruckner was n
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were written for the organ. 7 While
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prelude/fugue pair. Perhaps rather
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practice is less concerned with the
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Baroque, but did so subtly, without
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periodicity and its fluctuating ton
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eauty with ‘an excess of art.’
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(op.35/1) is a model of textural co
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410
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inhospitable to fugue.’ 30 To the
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W. F. Bach, Fugue in F minor BRA 88
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Exx.2.11-13 S. Wesley, ‘4 Fugues
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Chapter 4 Mozart, finished and unfi
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ed. Joseph Joachim and Andreas Mose
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BIBLIOGRAPHY [anon.] ‘The organ r
Page 424 and 425:
Beethoven, Ludwig van, The letters
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Brown, Clive, ‘Perspectives on Be
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______ Beethoven (Oxford: Oxford Un
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zu Köln 1998, 315-321. ______ and
Page 432 and 433:
Fisk, Josiah, ‘Classical music an
Page 434 and 435:
______ ‘The “Grosse Fuge”: an
Page 436 and 437:
1967). Horowitz, Joseph, ‘Mozart
Page 438 and 439:
______ Fugue and fugato in Rococo a
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und ihrer frühen Rezeption’, Arc
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(1991). MacArdle, Donald W., ‘Bee
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contrappunto sopra il canto fermo (
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Nicolosi, Robert, T. S. Eliot and m
Page 448 and 449:
______ Double counterpoint and cano
Page 450 and 451:
Routh, Francis, Early English organ
Page 452 and 453:
Schwarz, John I. jr, ‘Samuel and
Page 454 and 455:
______ ‘Beethoven’s ninth symph
Page 456 and 457:
Record, 90 (1960), 163-74. ______
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and Baroque’, Church, stage, and
Page 460 and 461:
Winter, Robert S., ‘Of realizatio
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