J.S. Bach - Three Fantasias & Fugues, BWV 575-944 (1708-25)

Johann Sebastian Bach (31 March [O.S. 21 March] 1685 – 28 July 1750) was a German composer and musician of the Baroque period. He is known for instrumental compositions such as the Brandenburg Concertos and the Goldberg Variations as well as for vocal music such as the St Matthew Passion and the Mass in B minor. Since the 19th-century Bach Revival he has been generally regarded as one of the greatest composers of all time. Please support my channel: ko-fi.com/bartjebartmans Uploaded with special permission by performer Peter Watchorn www.musicaomnia.org/ 1. Fantasia & Fugue in A minor, BWV 904 (0:00 / 3:29) (1725?} 2. Fantasia & Fugue in A minor, BWV 944 (9:41 / 10:53) (1714?) 3. Fantasia in G minor (“duobus subjectis”) BWV 917 (17:51) (1710?) 4. Fugue in C minor BWV 575 (19:29) (1708-17) PETER WATCHORN, pedal harpsichord (Hubbard & Broekman after Ruckers/Blanchet/Taskin, 1990/after J.A. Hass, 1734) The Fantasia BWV 904 is a richly impressive work composed in strict four-part counterpoint, which manages also to incorporate the ritornello idea that Bach adopted from the concertos of Italian composers as a chief organizing principle: in this case the piece opens and closes with a full statement of this theme. The recurring nature of the 12-bar descending ritornello bass echoes the character of a chaconne or passacaglia. This piece works well with the bass-line of the ritornello played by the feet, which underlines the gravitas of the main subject, as distinct from the contrasting episodes. The elaborate four-voice Fugue, which may well have existed separately from the Fantasia during Bach’s lifetime falls into three distinct sections and employs two subjects. The Fantasia BWV 944 consists of just ten measures, entirely composed of white-notated chords, marked arpeggio, indicating that the performer is expected to expand the framework into an actual piece. The presence of this technique, with which an entire work is to be created provides a clue to the performance of similar sections in the Chromatic Fantasia – and vice versa. The Fantasia is followed by one of Bach’s most exciting, freely-composed and virtuosic three-voice fugues, which is entirely instrumental in character, and represents a pinnacle of contrapuntal achievement among Bach’s earlier fugues. The most significant manuscript source, in the hand of Bach’s brother, Johann Christoph, includes the Fantasia, which is absent in other surviving copies. This indicates an early composition date, perhaps contemporary with the Chromatic Fantasia. The G minor Fantasia “on two themes” is a compact, ingenious and earnest exploration of invertible counterpoint involving three, rather than two thematic ideas, all of which are presented in various permutations during the course of the work’s two minutes. The “duobus subjectis” refers to the double counterpoint announced after the brief opening flourish: two complementary tunes above and below a descending chromatic figure. In general mood, the work calls to mind the A minor Fantasia, BWV 904, where a similar thematic interplay is presented. Perhaps this work is an earlier essay in a similar style. This dramatic stand-alone Fugue BWV 575, grouped by the editors of the Bach Gesellschaft edition with three others (G major, BWV 576 – 577 and G minor, BWV 578) with its striking, three-unit rhetorical subject, unusually ambiguous harmony that results from the subject’s intervallic properties, and compelling dramatic flow recalls the final fugue of the E minor Toccata, BWV 914, an affinity that has often been noted by writers about Bach’s music.

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