frumuspub.net
the Website for
Fruhauf Music Publications
Johann Sebastian Bach
(1685-1750)
Fugue in C Minor,
S. 562 (Fragment)Continuation and Termination by
Ennis Fruhauf
Notes
Johann Sebastian Bach’s Fugue fragment in C minor, S. 562, is but one of a number of his works that has not survived intact; in fact, only the first twenty-six and one-half measures have been preserved in manuscript form.
The compositional style of S. 562 is not typical of Bach’s idiomatic writing for the organ: in particular, the fugue’s countersubject is not readily technically adaptive to the pedalboard, unlike a majority of his other organ fugue subjects. The polyphonic approach itself includes occasional unusual overlapping and crossing of voices that would be more likely to occur in ensemble repertory than in solo literature. The subject of the fugue is notable, however, in its use of a chain of syncopations, a trait that is characteristic of Bach’s writing. Also notable, in its melodic inversion, the subject presents the first six notes of the theme of Bach’s organ Passacaglia in C minor (which was, in its turn, drawn from the first half of the Christe from André Raison’s Organ Mass in D minor).
S. 562 presents a serious challenge as a reconstruction project, perhaps a fanciful one, in that there are few guideposts to suggest what Bach himself might have written. The continuation and termination presented here include the introduction of a contrasting second countersubject, inversion of the fugue subject itself, stretto presentations of the subject and second countersubject, a brief cadenza, and a concluding cadential subject statement.
Copyright © 2004 Ennis Fruhauf
Home Page Order Form