HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL

Wednesday, April 18, 2007

The Fugue

written for a group of instruments or voices, or for a single instrument like an organ or harpsichord. A fugue is a polyphonic composition based on one main theme, called a subject. Throughout the fugue, different melodic lines, called voices, imitate the subject. The top melodic line - whether sung or played - is the soprano voice, and the bottom is the bass. The texture of a fugue usually includes three, four, or five voices. Though the subject remains fairly constant throughout, it takes on new meanings when shifted to different keys or combined with different melodic and rhythmic ideas.
The form of a fugue is extremely flexible; in fact, the only constant feature of fugues is how they begin - the subject is almost always presented in a single, unaccompanied voice. By thus highlighting the subject, the composer tells us what to remember and listen for. In getting to know a fugue, try to follow its subject through the different levels of texture. After its first presentation, the subject is imitated in turn by all the remaining voices.
First voice: tonic scale
Second voice: dominant scale (answer)
countersubject: different melodic idea
episodes: transitional sections between presentations of subject (offer either new material or fragments of subject/countersubject)
stretto: subject is imitated before it is completed; one voice tries to catch the other
pedal point/organ point: single tone (usually in bass) held while the other voices produce a series of changing harmonies against it

A fugue subject can be varied in four principal ways:

1. inversion : turned upside down
2. retrograde : beginning with last note of subject and proceeding backward to the first
3. augmentation : lengthened time values
4. diminution : shortened time values

prelude: short piece introducing an independent fugue

eg. Bach, Handel

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