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

‘passive’ voices; Ex.4.5 shows how simple the counterpoint to the entries can be.
Even when the motivic interplay is quite rapid, only one voice is active at a time
(Ex.4.6):
The resemblance to continuo realisation may not be coincidental, as Pasquini
was a leading exponent of the partimento-fugue. Partimenti were exercises in figured
(or unfigured) bass performance notated on a single staff. Though obviously
pedagogic in function, some examples show considerable sophistication and musical
interest; and, as many examples by Pasquini and others show it is quite possible to
notate complete fugues in this manner. 47 The very existence of this possibility says
quite a lot about their attitude toward fugal texture. Perhaps significantly, J. S. Bach
did not leave a single example of this genre. 48
No absolute distinction can be drawn between fully written-out textures and
those originating from thoroughbass realisation. Both are governed by common
principles of musical grammar; if anything, an improvised realisation is likely to be the
more orthodox and conventional. Well-trained fingers will produce a texture which
does preserve a certain amount of vocal integrity, simply in getting from one chord to
47 See W. Renwick (ed.), The Langloz manuscript: fugal improvisation through figured bass (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 2001), and ‘Monuments of Partimenti’, ed. R. O. Gjerdingen, http://facultyweb.at.northwestern.edu/music/gjerdingen/partimenti/
(accessed 4 October 2006).
48 The two examples attributed to him (BWV 907 and 908) appear to be by G. Kirchhoff. Handel, on
the other hand, wrote an expertly graded series of partimenti for Princess Anne, taking her in easy
steps from the simplest exercises through to quite complex fugues.
272