Fugue in d minor

A four-part fugue exercise composed on a given subject, with no particular instrumentation in mind. Developing the subject contrapuntally wasn’t difficult, but after a while it became rather monotonous. The labels A1, A2, B1, etc. indicate the various fragments on which the episodes are built. (The slurs are only meant to highlight motifs for my own reference.)

For future fugues, to break up the monotony, maybe you could have more sequences with less voices? For most of Bach's 4-voice fugues, like half the fugue is for less than 4 voices. So having lots of 3 or 2 voice sequences and switching which voice combinations are doing said sequences really helps with monotony. Thank you for the enjoyable fugue 🙂

Thanks for the comment! You’re absolutely right that thinning out the texture can help keep things fresh — that idea crossed my mind as well while writing.

I treated it more like a fugue d’école rather than a stylistically Baroque fugue (the subject itself is a 20th‑century textbook theme), so I kept the four‑voice texture going longer than I normally would. I also thought about extending some of the three‑voice spots, but the subject is already pretty long and the tempo is on the slower side, so the whole thing was starting to feel a bit too stretched out.

Still, your point is totally valid, and I appreciate you mentioning it. Glad you enjoyed the fugue!

Hallo @Fermata!

Your asking about the issue of „monotony“ in your fugue.

Sometimes it is not an issue with the composition itself, but rather a question of the interpretation or recording. Since you are using four string instruments „played“ by your notation software, you  „naturally“ encounter the problem that the entire piece sounds somewhat monotonous. Even real string instruments blend the sound very well, in my opinion, but are not as expressive for individual voices.

I can imagine, when played on a piano, the impression would be totally different.

As currently discussed in another thread

@PeterthePapercomPoser suggested to improve the recording by “fine-tuning” the articulation, dynamics, and tempo for each individual hand or even voice.

I also had a fugue which I considered to be „boring“ and I was nearly to get around and throw it away. But then I applied such tiny adjustments in the tempo, for example to make the first bar of the subject a little bit „swinging“, which dramatically changed the perception. Since I do so now with all of my piano works, I know that it is a lot of work to literally maintain two scores, one for the printout and one for the recording. But it's really worth the effort to achieve a sound that is much closer to a live performance.

Concerning the composition „as is“, I think there are no issues. With a short overview on the score I see that you already applied the necessary counterpuntual techniques (such as tonal answer, a recurring countersubject, inversion, augmentation, stretto).

As in 6/2 meter with mostly half and quarternotes (perhaps in an older, more Palestrinian style), it would be not appropriate to add passages (in episodes) or countersubjects with a faster rhythm.

Perhaps one could introduce a kind of diminution which doesn’t increase the rhythmic pulse by doubling the speed but is merely a rhythmic variant of the original subject preserving the quarternotes as the fastest ones, finally resulting in a 1.5x diminution (such as in Bach’s D# minor fugue from the WTC1 BWV 853).

10 hours ago, Wieland Handke said:

Sometimes it is not an issue with the composition itself, but rather a question of the interpretation or recording. Since you are using four string instruments „played“ by your notation software, you  „naturally“ encounter the problem that the entire piece sounds somewhat monotonous.

[...]

I also had a fugue which I considered to be „boring“ and I was nearly to get around and throw it away. But then I applied such tiny adjustments in the tempo, for example to make the first bar of the subject a little bit „swinging“, which dramatically changed the perception. Since I do so now with all of my piano works, I know that it is a lot of work to literally maintain two scores, one for the printout and one for the recording. But it's really worth the effort to achieve a sound that is much closer to a live performance.

Thanks for your detailed thoughts! When I mentioned monotony, I was referring more to the process of working with a long, slow subject - after a while the contrapuntal development itself felt a bit repetitive to write. The fugue was an exercise I worked out on paper with pen, mainly as a kind of contrapuntal puzzle, which I've always enjoyed doing as a hobby.

That said, you're absolutely right that the playback could be improved. I didn't add any articulation or dynamics, so the notation software makes everything sound much flatter than it would in a real performance. I'll try revising it along the lines you suggest to make it sound more natural. Thanks again for taking the time to comment!

Here's my beginner's non-academic point of view (for what it is worth): @Fermata's Fugue in D minor sounds flawless and tasteful. The given motive is very interesting. It is rich in complexity, and intriguing because it feels 'incomplete'. It calls for contrasting complements. Also, is it suitable for a fugue where it has to be frequently repeated?  It would be nice as a theme for a long development with less imitation. That's my personnal impression.