#bachstretch

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Bach Stretch No. 5: An Exposition 

I really have a hard time coming up with the proper titles for these works. This one seems so dry compared to what the audible product sounds like. Yet, since I use this process of recomposition as a means (and an end) to discuss analytical components of Bach's music, sometimes the dryness of music theory bubbles to the surface. 

I consolidate the major elements of the exposition of this three voice fugue into a nearly 7 minute stretch. There are three entrances; the first is on D5, second on G4, and the third on G5. These entrances are followed by a reentrance of the subject on D5 (which I don't include in the stretch and count as fourth voice since it is simply reiterating the opening subject at the same pitch class level),episode and closing material. I stretch each subject (main fugal theme), followed by the quickly moving harmony of the chromatic ending of the first episode, thus concluding the exposition.

I tried to be rigorous in the stretching techniques used by maintaining a certain consistency in stretch factor (10) and time resolution (.25). I extracted different parts of each subject entry for further "stretchification" that still used the SF 10/TR .25 scaling. The effect of this is a lot of bleeding of tones within and between each subject. Lastly, this bleeding within and between becomes intensified dramatically when the closing episodic material enters around 2'39". For at least two minutes we are in a wash of dissonance until the G3 pedal tone is remaining with a short lift (surprise) to the D6 that reintroduces the subject. 

For clarity's sake here are the times when you should hear each subject entrance throughout the track:

Subject 1: 0"-52"

Subject 2: 52"-1'46"

Subject 3: 1'46"-2'39"

Closing Episodic Material: 2'39"-6'13"

Surprise: 6'13"-6'38"

Here is a public link to an annotated score that shows what material I used and when it appears in the track.

Below is the original recording I used (sorry if you aren't a Spotify user). It might be instructive to listen to the first 45 seconds, if not the whole thing.

Christian Tetzlaff – 3 Sonatas & 3 Partitas, BWV 1001-1006, Sonata No.1 in G Minor, BWV 1001: II. Fuga (Allegro)

Happy listening!

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 Bach Stretch #4: The Not-So-Brief Bourrée

What stands out in this rather quickly moving bourrée, as seen here in a version by Gil Shaham, are the interpolated chords (double stops). Besides standing out in a textural manner, they also signal to the listener the beginnings of particular sections of a truncated ternary form (A-B-a') at a micro level, but at a macro level it is simply a binary form, as follows:

||:A:||:B|a':||

The A and B are obvious markers both in weight (up to downbeat) and proportion (similar amount of music that follows each section). The "a'" notation, however, shows that A does return, but in a rather (in)significant manner. In this case what follows the B,E to A,C# dyad (a') is not as significant as its own appearance which marks, as brief as it is, a sort of return immediately followed by a nice authentic cadence that closes the piece. This shows Bach's awareness of how much the double dyads (sounds redundant, I know) stick out as formal markers.

Of course those formal markers are what stood out to me when I listened as well and they are the bulk of the material that I stretched out. I approached each dyad pair in similar terms. The ending dyad of the pair is the harmony I stretch out the most. Observe the following (and you should definitely look at the annotated PDF of the score below as a guide):

Longest Stretch: E,B dyad Treated as a pedal tone throughout the work.

A,C# and E,G# appear as the other two long stretches (dovetailed between each other of course). So, using the micro-ternary/macro-binary as a guide it looks/sounds like this:

||:A [E,B--A,C#(long dyad stretch] :||:B [B,F#--E,G#(long dyad stretch) a'[E,B--A,C#(not-as-long dyad stretch| PAC :||

  Score

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Bach Stretch #3: Canon e Organum

In this stretch I create a canon from the first three measures of the Gigue from the Cello Suite #5 in C Minor. It is basically a decorated c minor triad descent. Each pitch is stretched out as separate files then recombined into a recurring canon. Since there are nine total pitches, there are nine entrances for each canon spread out in a random manner, with the last two (D-E) entering more closely together. Throughout, the whole nine note canon is stretched to fit within the whole 1'36" duration. In a way, this seems to be a nod to the organum polyphony of Leonin and Perotin.