The Art of Fugue: Bach Fugues for Keyboard, 1715–1750

Joseph Kerman

Open Access Published by University of California Press 2015

The Art of Fugue

Bach Fugues for Keyboard, 1715–1750

Joseph Kerman

https://doi.org/10.1515/9780520962590

Overview
Contents

About this book

A free ebook version of this title is available through Luminos, University of California Press’s new open access publishing program for monographs. Visit www.luminosoa.org to learn more.

Fugue for J. S. Bach was a natural language; he wrote fugues in organ toccatas and voluntaries, in masses and motets, in orchestral and chamber music, and even in his sonatas for violin solo. The more intimate fugues he wrote for keyboard are among the greatest, most influential, and best-loved works in all of Western music. They have long been the foundation of the keyboard repertory, played by beginning students and world-famous virtuosi alike. In a series of elegantly written essays, eminent musicologist Joseph Kerman discusses his favorite Bach keyboard fugues—some of them among the best-known fugues and others much less familiar. Kerman skillfully, at times playfully, reveals the inner workings of these pieces, linking the form of the fugues with their many different characters and expressive qualities, and illuminating what makes them particularly beautiful, powerful, and moving.

These witty, insightful pieces, addressed to musical amateurs as well as to specialists and students, are beautifully augmented by performances made specially for this volume: Karen Rosenak, piano, playing two preludes and fugues fromTheWell-Tempered Clavier—C Major, book 1; and B Major, book 2--and Davitt Moroney playing the Fughetta in C Major, BWV 952, on clavichord; the Fugue on "Jesus Christus unser Heiland," BWV 689, on organ; and the Fantasy and Fugue in A Minor, BWV 904, on harpsichord.

Author / Editor information

Kerman Joseph :

Joseph Kerman was Professor Emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley, and author of Concerto Conversations, Write All These Down, and Opera as Drama, among other books. He was a founding editor of the journal 19th-Century Music and a regular contributor to the New York Review.

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	ix
List of Recordings and Scores Publicly Available Download PDF	xiii
Preface Publicly Available Download PDF	xvii
Acknowledgments Publicly Available Download PDF	xxiii
1. Fugue in C Major: The Well-Tempered Clavier, book 1 Open Access Download PDF	1
2. Fugue in C Minor: The Well-Tempered Clavier, book 1 Open Access Download PDF	10
3. Fughetta in C Major, BWV 952 Open Access Download PDF	15
4. Fugue in C-sharp Minor: The Well-Tempered Clavier, book 1 Open Access Download PDF	20
5. Contrapunctus 1: The Art of Fugue Open Access Download PDF	30
6. Contrapunctus 10: The Art of Fugue Open Access Download PDF	36
7. Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue, BWV 903 Open Access Download PDF	47
8. Prelude and Fugue in E-flat Major: The Well-Tempered Clavier, book 1 Open Access Download PDF	60
9. Fugue in E Major: The Well-Tempered Clavier, book 2 Open Access Download PDF	69
10. Fugue on “Jesus Christus unser Heiland”: Clavierübung, book 3 Open Access Download PDF	79
11. Fugue in F-sharp Minor: The Well-Tempered Clavier, book 1 Open Access Download PDF	89
12. Gigue: English Suite no. 3 in G Minor Open Access Download PDF	96
13. Fugue in A-flat Major: The Well-Tempered Clavier, book 1 Open Access Download PDF	101
14. Fugue in A Minor: Fantasy and Fugue in A Minor, BWV 904 Open Access Download PDF	107
15. Fugue in B-flat Major: The Well-Tempered Clavier, book 2 Open Access Download PDF	118
16. Fugue in B Major: The Well-Tempered Clavier, book 2 Open Access Download PDF	125
Afterword Open Access Download PDF	135
Notes Open Access Download PDF	141
Notes to the Recordings Open Access Download PDF	147
Glossary Open Access Download PDF	151
Bibliography Open Access Download PDF	159
Index Open Access Download PDF	163

Language: English
Publisher: University of California Press
Pages
- Main content: 192

eBook

Published: June 23, 2015
ISBN: 9780520962590