Quote:
Originally Posted by Zetetic
The fugue works more as an exercise than a piece - I've plotted out the structure in Microsoft Excel, and it displays as a myriad of different cells, inversions and so on. So in a way I consider the fact that it actually works as a piece (despite all the contrivances) very pleasing. Also, it will hopefully provide an objective aspect to the composition, which will mop up some extra marks.
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I'm sorry to say it sounds like that. I got the feeling you were "doing the job" rather than writing music. The subject you're using is REALLY complicated to work with, and you're doing stuff like having having seconds intervals at strong beats in 2 voice counterpoint, so that stuff is sort of jarring. I don't mind if it's modern or neo-baroque, it's just that apparently you let a formula write it for you.
I'm a fan of Hindemith's fugues and stuff with tons of dissonances and, haha, "wrong notes", so it's not a matter of taste. I just think maybe a little more writing and less planning in your case could help smooth the whole counterpoint writing thing. Also, you also did what is a pretty common error, having all voices going on all the time. Sure, it looks or may sound impressive, but really, I couldn't understand half the stuff you were trying to do. At one point you invert the subject, but you do it in such a way that it sounds like a second subject rather than just an inversion.
But well, that's looking at it from a strict point of view, I really didn't like the fantasia much, and I skipped the repetition. I'd say the best thing out of the whole thing is the fugue subject. Try writing a different fugue with it again, maybe? Though it's a very hard subject to work with, it's good practice.