Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue (Bach)

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The Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue in D minor ( BWV 903) is a work for harpsichord or piano by Johann Sebastian Bach . Bach's time in Köthen (1717–1723) is assumed to be the time of origin. The piece is one of Bach's most important compositions and was already considered a unique masterpiece in its day.

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An autograph of this work is not known. Because of the improvisational, expressive and all-key style of the composition, Walther Siegmund-Schultze assigns it to the time of the “fermenting Köthen works of upheaval”.

At least 16 different handwritten copies of the musical text exist, including five from Bach's lifetime. The oldest copy includes only an early, two bars shorter version of the Fantasy, comes from the Bach student Johann Tobias Krebs and was made after 1717, i.e. close to the time of creation. Two further copies were made around 1730 and also include the fugue; Gottfried Grünewald or Christoph Graupner are presumed to be notators . A copy of the double work comes from Johann Friedrich Agricola and was created between 1738 and 1740. A copy of Johann Gottfried Müthel's Fantasy from 1750 and a complete copy by Johann Nikolaus Forkel (1800) are based on it. The first printed editions of the work by Franz Anton Hoffmeister (1802) and Friedrich Konrad Griepenkerl (1819) are based on these two manuscripts . Because of the strong deviations in details, which cannot be traced back to a common basic form, it is assumed that Bach himself noted various variants of the work and brought them into circulation.

structure

The fantasy begins as a toccata with fast, up and down undulating runs in thirty-second notes and broken chords in sixteenth-note triplets, in which diminished seventh chords are often strung together at semitones. The second part is a series of very freely and widely modulating, calmly stepping chords, which are already entitled " Arpeggio " in the oldest copies , that is, they require a broken execution. The third part is entitled “Recitative” and contains a strongly expressive melody enriched with many different ornaments. In this part there are noticeable enharmonic mix-ups , which require the well-tempered tuning of the keyboard instruments during Bach's time in Koethen. The recitative goes into a final passage chromatically sinking diminished seventh chords above the pedal point D on.

The theme of the fugue begins with a line ascending in semitone steps from a to c, here from the third to the fifth of the major key of F major, which is parallel to D minor, and swings from there with another line ascending chromatically from e to g G minor over and modulates from there back to the main key D minor:

\ relative c '' {\ key d \ minor \ time 3/4 a bes bc [c8 b] c4 e, f fis g [g8 fis ga] bes4 agf [g8 fed] e4 a, cis d}

From the characteristic, chromatically ascending lines of the fugue theme, the later addition of "chromatic" to the name, which did not come from Bach, resulted for the entire work.

Reception and interpretation

The virtuoso and improvisational toccata style of the fantasy, in which both hands quickly alternate, the key of D minor and the expressive, key experimental character put the work of the well-known Toccata and Fugue in D minor (BWV 565) to the side. With it, the work is one of Bach's extraordinary and therefore particularly popular compositions for keyboard instruments. Bach's contemporaries shared this assessment. His son Wilhelm Friedemann Bach , who himself was an excellent improviser, said the work “remains beautiful in all saecula”. Bach's first biographer , Johann Nikolaus Forkel , wrote: “I have taken great pains to find another piece of this type of Bach. But in vain. This fantasy is unique and has never been like it. "

The work became a prime example of the romantic interpretation of Bach in the 19th century. Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy , the founder of the Bach renaissance , played the fantasy in February 1840 and 1841 in a series of concerts in the Leipzig Gewandhaus and delighted the audience with it. He attributed this effect to his free interpretation of the arpeggios of the fantasy. He used the sound effects of the concert grand of that time through a differentiated dynamic, the highlighting of peak notes, the excessive use of the sound pedal and doubled bass notes. This interpretation became the model for the second movement (Adagio) of Mendelssohn's second sonata for cello and piano (op. 58, composed 1841–1843): In it, the top notes of the piano argeggio result in a chorale melody, while the cello plays an extended recitative , which is similar to the recitative of Bach's Chromatic Fantasy and quotes its final passage.

This romantic interpretation had a school-building effect: since then, many famous pianists and composers, including Franz Liszt and Johannes Brahms , have included this work by Bach in their concert repertoire as an effective demonstration of virtuosity and expressivity. It was reprinted in many editions with interpretive additions and playing instructions. The romantic Bach interpreter Ferruccio Busoni, for example, distinguished the final passage as a coda from the recitative in his work edition . A late romantic organ arrangement was made by Max Reger . Even after turning back to historical instruments and being faithful to the work , it remained one of the most popular concert pieces and most of Bach's recorded works.

A romantic interpretation is represented by Edwin Fischer , Wilhelm Kempff and Samuil Feinberg , in some cases also Alfred Brendel on the concert grand and Wanda Landowska on the harpsichord. Glenn Gould , who has influenced many newer pianists such as András Schiff and Alexis Weissenberg , represents a de-romanticized interpretation that avoids the use of the piano pedal, yet has a brilliant, sonorous interpretation with idiosyncratic surprising accents . The pianist Agi Jambor combines romantic sonority and color with clear voice guidance and emphasizes the structural relationships. In 1940 Kaikhosru Shapurji Sorabji composed a virtuoso paraphrase of the fantasy.

Transcriptions

The chromatic fantasy and fugue were also arranged for classical guitar. Jaco Pastorius played the first part of the fantasy on the electric bass on the album " Word of Mouth " (1981).

In 2015 the Friedrich Hofmeister Musikverlag published a transcription of the Chromatic Fantasy for violoncello , created by Johann Sebastian Paetsch.

literature

Urtext editions
Musical analysis
  • Martin Geck (ed.): Bach interpretations. Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht, 2nd edition, Göttingen 1982, ISBN 3525332769 , pp. 57–73 and 213–215
  • Stefan Drees : On speaking of instruments: On the history of the instrumental recitative. Peter Lang, Frankfurt am Main 2007, ISBN 3631564783 , pp. 75-78

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Cristoph Rueger (Ed.): Johann Sebastian Bach . In: Harenberg piano music guide . Harenberg, Dortmund 1984, ISBN 3-611-00679-3 , p. 85.
  2. ↑ Tamás Zászkaliczky (Ed.): Editor's Notes . In: Fantasias & Toccatas: for piano, for piano / Johann Sebastian Bach . Könemann Music, Budapest 2000, p. 86f.
  3. ↑ Hermann Keller: Studies on Harmonics Joh. Seb. Bach's . In: Bach yearbook . Vol. 41 (1954), pp. 50-65. doi: 10.13141 / bjb.v19541543
  4. ↑ a b Cristoph Rueger (Ed.): Johann Sebastian Bach . In: Harenberg piano music guide . Harenberg, Dortmund 1984, ISBN 3-611-00679-3 , p. 86.
  5. ↑ Wolfgang Dinglinger: “The arpeggios are the main effect.” Comments on the Adagio of the second cello sonata op. 58 by Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy. In: Cordula Heymann-Wentzel, Johannes Laas: Music and biography: Festschrift for Rainer Cadenbach. Königshausen & Neumann, 2004, ISBN 382602804X , pp. 65-68
  6. ↑ Audio sample: Edwin Fischer plays Bach Chromatic Fantasy BWV 903 ; Edwin Fischer plays Bach Chromatic Fugue BWV 903
  7. ↑ Audio sample: Bach, Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue BWV903 (part 1, Fantasy) played by Wilhelm Kempff
  8. ↑ Audio sample: Samuil Feinberg plays Bach Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue
  9. ↑ Audio sample: Alfred Brendel playes Bach's Chromatic Fantasy
  10. ↑ Audio sample: JSBach-Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue. Landowska Part 1 Fantasia ; JSBach-Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue-Landowska Part 2 Fugue
  11. ↑ Audio sample: Glenn Gould plays Bach Chromatic Fantasy BWV 903
  12. ↑ Audio sample: JSBach, Fugue in D minor BWV 903 (András Schiff)
  13. ↑ Audio sample: Weissenberg - Bach - Chromatic Fantasy (BWV903) , video recording from February 2, 1969
  14. ↑ Audio sample: Agi Jambor - Bach Chromatic Fantasy & Fugue 1/2 ; Agi Jambor - Bach Chromatic Fantasy & Fugue 2/2
  15. ↑ Chromatic Fantasy by Kaukhosru Sorabji on The Sorabji Archive
  16. ↑ Audio sample: Jorge Caballero plays Bach Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue (1/3) ; (2/3) ; (3/3)
  17. ↑ Jaco Pastorius: Chromatic Fantasy (Remastered LP Version). From the album " Word of Mouth " (Rhino / Warner Brothers, 1981); Audio sample: Jaco Pastorius: Chromatic Fantasy (around 4:00 to 5:10)
  18. ↑ Johann Sebastian Paetsch (Ed.): 3 pieces by BWV 565, 903, 1004 for solo cello. Friedrich Hofmeister, FH 3021, Leipzig 2015, ISMN 9790203430216