Re: GG: (Art of Fugue - Rosen)

[Bradley P Lehman <bpl@umich.edu>]

On Tue, 16 Sep 1997, K. Berry wrote:

>     one of the things I love about playing Bach is how the music comes into
>     focus more and more over time
> 
> I'd just like to second this as strongly as I can.  I'd also like to
> quote some of Charles Rosen's liner notes for his recording of the Art
> of the Fugue.  It was these words that gave me the courage to try to
> play Contrapunctus I.  I'll never play in a concert hall to a multitude,
> but being able to play any of the A.of.F. for myself has given me a lot
> of joy.

I'll third that.  The Art of Fugue is (so far) for me the most
exhilarating and satisfying piece to play in the entire harpsichord
literature.  It's a piece to be best experienced by playing it.  It's like
solving a series of puzzles: puzzles which tax one's resourcefulness in a
number of different ways at once, and becomes a comprehensive "How to
Learn Music" textbook.  It seems to engage more parts of the brain at once
than other music. 

It takes remarkable degrees of concentration, physical and mental stamina,
analytical homework, *and* encourages the development of new playing
techniques (and relaxation techniques for the hands), just to get through
it.  Same degree of preparatory training that (I imagine) one would go
through in planning to run a marathon.  Playing through from first note to
last in one sitting then gives one of those "YES!!!!!" euphoric
experiences at the end, in addition to the joy of the music all the way
along.  (Contrapunctus XI and the mirror movements take plenty out of the
player just in themselves, so it's nice to have all the earlier ones to
get warmed up and limber....)

Something else which my professor and I both noticed when I brought
different parts in for lessons, but which we hadn't seen much of in the
literature yet: the whole work seems to be a progressive tutor in *playing
the keyboard*.  Not only do the contrapuntal techniques get more difficult
as the piece goes along, but the physical motions require greater control
and a greater variety of techniques with the fingers/wrists/arms, just to
get the notes accurately.  I've seen this mentioned only once in print: 
Robert Hill, in the booklet notes to his recording, says some things about
"the art of fingering." 

And it's not only the art of playing determined notes; keyboard mastery
also includes improvisation and composition.  Bach leaves places to
improvise a bit while playing: a short cadenza in one of the canons, and
maybe also a cadenza toward the end of Contrapunctus I.  And there's also
the issue of what to do at the end of the last big fugue...stop where Bach
did in the print, or stop where Bach did in the earlier manuscript
(farther than the print), or compose a completion, or play someone else's
completion, or (gulp) improvise a completion!? 

>   ... Let us put ourselves in the place of one of the ``happy few'', the
>   rare and select forty who bought a copy of the Art of Fugue.  [The first
>   edition sold 40 copies --K]  We know, as we buy it, that it is not a
>   work we will ever hear in a concert.  ... Its place was in the home.  As
>   we bought our copy of the Art of Fugue we would know that the only way
>   to hear it was to take it home and read as much of it at a time as we
>   wished on whatever keyboard we possessed.
> 
>   ... This intimate character of the Art of the Fugue is part of its
>   essence: it is meant to be played for oneself and perhaps a few
>   interested friends.  ... It is, above all, a work for oneself to play,
>   to feel under one's fingers as well as to hear. ...
>   
>   It is a summary of the life that Bach had devoted to his art, a
>   demonstration and proof of the contrapuntal power with which he had
>   written for almost half a century.  The Art of Fugue is also, however,
>   a new departure for the composer: untiul then, he had written nothing
>   so sober or so auster, nothing in which his art was so naked.
>   
>   -- Charles Rosen.

This tribute by Rosen sure sounds like an echo of Sir Donald Francis
Tovey, writing in his 1931 edition.  He emphasizes very strongly the need
to *play* it, working through it diligently as best one can, to really get
the effect. 

-----

By the way, I noticed recently somewhere that there's now a *third*
recording of the whole piece played by saxophone quartet! 

-----

I still haven't figured out why GG chose to add those jarring tempo
changes to his performance of Contrapunctus XI.  They blow apart the whole
structure of the piece.  He argued so firmly about that sort of thing
vis-a-vis the Hindemith piano sonatas, how Hindemith had committed an
error in bringing in a theme at the wrong speed, yadda yadda yadda...and
then he commits the same sort of error himself, adding arbitrary tempo
shifts to Bach!  Why? 

There's also another new review of GG's reissued "Art of Fugue" recording
in the newest _American Record Guide_. 

Bradley Lehman ~ Harrisonburg VA, USA ~ 38.44N+78.87W
bpl@umich.edu ~ http://www-personal.umich.edu/~bpl/