Prelude and Fugue in G sharp minor BWV 887 (The Well-Tempered Clavier, Part II)

Prelude and Fugue in G sharp minor , BWV 887, form a pair of works in the 2nd part of the Well-Tempered Clavier , a collection of preludes and fugues for keyboard instruments by Johann Sebastian Bach .

Prelude

If one did not know it, the assumption that this was a composition by the Bach sons Wilhelm Friedemann or Carl Philipp Emanuel or the greatly underrated Bach student Johann Gottfried Müthel could not be dismissed.

As is often the case in the second part of the Well-Tempered Clavier, Bach also proves to be a pioneer in this prelude. Already in the first bar, the wandering of the melodic line from the right to the left hand shows the distance to contrapuntal voice leading in favor of piano playing. Even the original forte and piano in bars 3 and 5, which is probably to be repeated in similar passages, the two-part form with Reprise effect in measure 41 by sequences is prepared, the accompanying figures of the left hand that nothing with counterpoint and basso continuo to have to do as well as the sensitive suspensions in thirds and Sexptarallelen are references to the pre-classical and at that time spreading gallant style .

Gap

Both the theme and the counterpoint consist of two sequences of two bars each. However, they differed in that the theme is diatonic and the counterpoint is chromatic . In bar 61, a second, also chromatic theme appears, which is confusingly similar to counterpoint, apart from the final trill, which gives it a little more profile. Whether the piece can therefore be described as a double fugue is at least questionable.

The fugue comprises 143 bars and can be divided into three parts: the first part is devoted to the development of the first theme, in the second part from bar 61 the second theme is introduced, before the two themes are combined in the third part from bar 97. The outer links (60 + 47 bars) relate to the middle section (36 bars) as 3: 1; the first and second part (60 + 36 bars) to the third (47 bars) like 2: 1. Whether these numerical relationships are based on chance or on purpose cannot be clearly “proven”.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Peter Benary: JS Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier: Text - Analysis - Playback. MN 718, H. & B. Schneider AG. Aarau, 2005. p. 128
2. ↑ Peter Benary: JS Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier: Text - Analysis - Playback. MN 718, H. & B. Schneider AG. Aarau, 2005. p. 130

literature

• Peter Benary: JS Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier: Text - Analysis - Playback . MN 718, H. & B. Schneider AG. Aarau, 2005.
• Alfred Dürr : Johann Sebastian Bach - The Well-Tempered Clavier . Bärenreiter factory introductions. ISBN 9783761812297 . 4th edition 2012
• Cecil Gray: The forty-eight Preludes and Fugues of JS Bach . Oxford University Press, 1938.

Web links

• The Well-Tempered Clavier II, Johann Sebastian Bach : Sheet Music and Audio Files in the International Music Score Library Project
• Hermann Keller: BWV 887