Fugue on "We Wish You A Merry Christmas" (2017) - My entry for the Christmas Event!

Here's a little Christmas card for y'all I found from a few years ago.  It's probably not the best fugue ever written, not by a long shot, but it's fun.   

• Composed: December 22 - 24, 2017 at Austin
• Scoring: Keyboard solo
• Style: Baroque
• Duration: 2:09

Oh damn!   Looking at this again, in my haste I forgot the rule about tonal second voice entry under certain conditions.  Oh well, maybe I'll fix it later.  Mea culpa!  Master Fux, take a ruler to my knuckles!

This piece is just what I needed tonight, thank you

1 hour ago, J. Lee Graham said:

Oh damn!   Looking at this again, in my haste I forgot the rule about tonal second voice entry under certain conditions.  Oh well, maybe I'll fix it later.  Mea culpa!  Master Fux, take a ruler to my knuckles!

I'd say it's probably more of a "consistently used device for purely historical reasons", certainly a small detail not worth glossing over.

Overall I like the fugue, and as you said, it's indeed fun. I'm a big fan of how you chose to retain the original harmonisation through your countersubject(s). The piece just wouldn't be the same without it!

The counterpoint and motivic development are both very good. What I find lacking is the choice to include the extraneous 9th bar in the subject. At the risk of the fugue becoming a bit foursquare, I find its inclusion to be a little inelegant. In addition, the appearance of a rising chromatic scale in the subject harmonisation is something which I feel like should be explored more: the harmony in the episodes is too tame in comparison.

And we are off, again.  This time @J. Lee Graham brought us a fugue in 3 parts!

Exposition:

The subject ("we wish you a merry Christmas) is the tenor voice and does us.  bring good cheer.  He wrote this 3/8 instead the meter that song is written. You may ask why. That is to link to subject with the counter subject.   We then hear the CS once the full theme is stated this signal the next voice to bring more good cheer.  After each voice does this, we move onto the next part of the fugue where stretto could occur. 

Devolvement: 

Yes, there are stretto to be found.  and fragments of the subject exchanging between each voice is to be discovered. 

Recap:

Then we return to subject to fully round off the composition. 

Great job. 

Lovely little piece. I guess I shouldn't be surprised that a chain of secondary dominants works so well as a fugue subject, but I think you bring out its fullest potential. It makes little moments like mm. 32–33 so lovely because it's so diatonic but keeps the spirit of the sequence. Really cool to see what parts of the theme you kept and selected in certain parts.

I think m. 37 is the only bar that I'm not as big a fan of: the P5 (vaguely on ii?) into A4 (vii˚) feels a just the tiniest bit awkward because (I think? I've been having a hard time trying to think of a reason...) the third is neglected twice.

Congrats for turning such a cheesy holiday tune into something very enjoyable!

Hi @J. Lee Graham!

This is a really enjoyable fugue using the festive tune. I agree with all things said above especailly what @Monarcheon and @muchen_ said. The use of schematas like the Monte is very well noted throughout the piece.

I can't stop myself to post one of my earlier piece here two years ago, because I also use a Christmas tune (Jingle Bells) plus parodying one of @Thatguy v2.0 tune for a double fugue haha:

Thx very much for sharing this funny piece and joining the event!

Henry

Ha, a fugue, that’s something for me!

It's fun to hear how you've transformed this a bit hackneyed song into a baroque, festive harpsichord performance. 

The use of running sixteenth notes in the counter-subject, and especially in the interludes, creates a nice complementary rhythm which drives the piece forward in a festive way and gives the listener a good distinction between the thematic and transitional sections. This flow is only slightly disturbed in bars 66-68 where I, in my opinion, also wished more semiquavers to maintain the momentum.

I particularly like the coda with the pedal point and the final quotation from the theme in measure 120! In that sense: Happy New Year!

P.S. If anyone is a bit bored about „Jingle Bells“ and Co., Shostakovich’s Prelude 15, op 87 is a more spicy version of „We Wish You A Merry Christmas“ while the possible reference to that melody might be completely unintentionally.

Hey everybody!  Thanks very much for all your comments!  Happy New Year!