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Three Fugatos for Harpsichord, Op. 222 (Old Deleted Piece 1/181)


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These are my Three Fugatos for Harpsichord, Op. 222, composed in August 2014. 

This is one of my older pieces. I first posted it here in August 2014. But it, together with a lot of posted pieces (both mine and others') got erased once the new version of the website was introduced sometime in late April - early May 2016. I had posted 181 pieces before then that all got deleted. Fortunately I have copies of everything posted. But it is the work of having posted so many pieces only to end up being deleted that I lament. This is the first of those 181 that I am posting again. I might also post others from those 181 pieces in the future. Below is the description of the pieces adapted from their first posting.


These are my three fugatos for harpsichord. Before them I had only completed one piece for the harpsichord. I called the pieces 'fugato' since they do not follow all the 'rules' of a fugue, 'fugato' meaning "In the fugue style, but not in strict or complete fugue form" (Oxford Talking Dictionary, 1998).

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The title's a bit strange. They're more canons than fugatos. Fugato kind of implies it's in the middle of another piece.
Anyway, I quite like these. More than some of your other stuff, since the direction is a lot more clear with the trailing voice. One thing to fix is the beaming on your notes (in 4/4, you need to be able to see where the beat is easily, not just "in between" two beamed eighth notes).
The fusion between styles also works decently well. Certainly not baroque,  but not completely modern either. Just in terms of general counterpoint, watch out for big leaps after a short span of time.

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I like the experimental nature of these three pieces. To start with a counterpoint in parallel fourths and use parallel fifths and a hidden octave all in one measure (measure 3 of the first piece) produces a sound that is really off -- but as these deviations from classic counterpoint are used throughout and consistently, they provide an interesting colour. Fittingly, instead of a cadence, there are just two parallel octaves sinking to the tonic at the end, a technique used in the second piece as well, defying expectations of real closure.

I would just say that using the term "fugato" could be bit misleading, as one would expect a more thorough counterpoint then, but nonetheless three interesting explorations of two-voiced imitative writing in a cross-over style.

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