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

Karl Geiringer makes an almost embarrassing comparison by quoting the
superficially similar F minor sinfonia of Johann Sebastian, the deepest and most
searching of them all. 71 If Friedemann’s fugue has to succeed on these terms—that is,
as a sophisticated combinatorial work, rich in expressive contrapuntal detail and
capable of sustaining a very slow tempo—we might as well accept that it is a dismal
and unequivocal failure. But is it really the same sort of piece? If we can disregard
Fedtke’s extraordinarily slow metronome marking of crotchet = 58, 72 think of it and
play it as a lighter, more relaxed kind of music, it may make a little more sense.
At first it seems like a piece of alla breve counterpoint notated in halved note-
values, but as early as b.6, the melodic repetition in the treble raise doubts. The same
happens again in b.14, and again in b.18. This sort of writing simply does not make
any sense at all in a quasi-alla breve context; but as part of a lighter, more
harmonically conceived texture it is much more intelligible. In a sense this piece and
J. S. Bach’s F minor sinfonia are opposites. The sinfonia is intensive, a deep mining
operation to see how much can be derived from a small quantity of invertible material.
Friedemann’s fugue is extensive: the uniform aggregate motion in quavers disguises a
surprisingly wide variety of textures: conservative invertible counterpoint (bb.1-5),
harmonic writing (bb.6-8), sequential suspensions (bb.29-41), galant syncopated thirds
and sixths (71-77), melody accompanied by repeated chords (96-99), close imitation
(88-93, 129-133, 180-181), and appoggiaturas over a moving bass (190-197).
However, at more than two hundred bars’ length, it really is too much of a (fairly)
good thing. As with the previous fugue, the strength and individuality of the subject is
less important than the shape of the texture as a whole. For example, the hovering
around a minor third that seems so peculiar in b.6 makes much more sense in bb.14-21
71 K. and I Geiringer, The Bach family; seven generations of creative genius (London: Allen & Unwin,
1954), p.319.
72 Which makes the piece an unendurable seven minutes long. Has anyone ever actually played it all
the way through at that tempo?
77