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

esponse was: ‘the fugue is no longer a fugue.’ 4 It has to be admitted that I did quail at
the prospect of tabulating the details of hundreds of movements whose defining
characteristic was their stylistic and structural uniformity.
There is no attempt here, then, at a comprehensive, blanket coverage of the
field in the manner of William S. Newman’s three-volume history of the Sonata, or
Warren Kirkendale’s Fugue and fugato in Rococo and Classical chamber music. 5
This project is instead a series of case-studies, five in number, each focusing upon a
specific point of interest within the wider topic. Each chapter concerns the
engagement of a particular composer with his own and other fugal traditions. It is not
simply a description or summary of the composer’s fugal output—the references and
bibliography will make it sufficiently clear that most of this ground has already been
covered, often in considerable detail. Instead, each chapter devotes itself to a
particular question that is raised by the consideration of this body of work. In every
case it is the question, rather than the oeuvre in general, that is the focus.
The first chapter, ‘The circle of J. S. Bach’, begins by tackling a problem that is
central to this study. The fugues of J. S. Bach are ‘canonical’ works, the focus of
scholarship and analysis, in constant performance, and (not least important)
passionately admired and loved. The fugues of even his closest followers are not. But
when faced with a fugue by (say) Johann Ludwig Krebs or Wilhelm Friedemann Bach
that shows many of the same qualities as those of their teacher, the thought comes,
unbidden: ‘how would I respond to this piece if it were by J. S. Bach? Could I
imagine enjoying it in the same way?’ There is no way of answering this question
directly, of course: the piece comes to us stamped with its origin, like a Wedgwood
4 Letter to Breitkopf und Härtel (26 Dec 1802): W. Thayer rev. E. Forbes, Thayer’s life of Beethoven
(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1970), p.320.
5 W. S. Newman, The sonata in the Baroque era, 4 th ed. (New York: Norton, 1983). The sonata in
the Classic era, 3 rd ed. (New York: Norton, 1983). The sonata since Beethoven, 3 rd ed. (New York:
Norton, 1983). W. Kirkendale, Fugue and fugato in Rococo and Classical chamber music, 2 nd ed.
(Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1979).
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