David's Well-Tempered Clavier Project @wtcproject - Tumblr Blog

This is a redo of the first WTC piece I recorded back in September 2008. I wanted to see the before/after contrast!

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Yes! #bach is a way of life!

#bach

Bach, J.S.: Well-Tempered Clavier I Fugue XXIV in B Minor, BWV 869

This is the final fugue of Book I and, fittingly, the final piece in this project. At the time, Bach likely didn't have any intention of writing a Book II and wrote this fugue as a final work, a summation of all the preludes and fugues that preceded it. Its subject is 24 eighth note pulses long--the number of prelude/fugue pairs in the book--and contains all 12 tones of the scale, making it the world's first 12-tone composition, and predating Schoenberg's system by 200 years. In terms of chromaticism, dissonance, drama, and form, Bach pushed the contemporary limits of composition to the very utmost and beyond with this epic fugue.

Five years, six months, and 24 days ago, I sat down on a sweaty September afternoon and recorded the Ab Major prelude from Book I with a crappy digital recorder my partner didn't use anymore. I left the windows open and banged it out in competition with street noise, the odd siren, and cicadas buzzing at the height of summer. At the time I had played piano only occasionally since high school and hadn't truly practiced anything for nearly 16 years. I didn't sound so great that day, but it felt good. A few months later, I did another recording, and then another, and then sometime in 2009 decided to do it as a project, "both books in no particular order, for no particular reason." That last bit isn't entirely true, I just didn't know the reasons at the time.

Call me trite, but the end of any big, multi-year project is bittersweet, and this one was the most satisfying of my life. It's hard to know what to do next, but I'm certain my landlady, neighbors, and especially my long-suffering partner, are overjoyed. (Matt and I still wonder if the incessant practicing was one of the reasons our previous neighbors moved out last year. Bless them, they never said a word.) For those of you who have been following for all these years, thank you for your support, words of encouragement, and indeed the occasional criticisms. Knowing that even just a few people are paying attention can be incredibly motivating.

#Bach #DAVIDCARDON #BWV 869

Well-Tempered Clavier II Fugue XXII in B-flat Minor BWV 891

One of the underlying motivations for doing this project, and studying Bach specifically, was a deep personal desire to overcome a pronounced right hand preference, a problem that went unresolved when I stopped formally studying piano 22 years ago. Asymmetrical hand preferences (i.e. when people use one hand to do things more because it is significantly more dextrous than the other) are common, but problems being common never stopped me from being irritated by them, and my irritation at having a left hand that isn't as cool, strong, or in control as my right only intensified with age. This fugue took 4 months to work up largely because of my left hand, which remains annoyingly lame even after over 4 years of persistent Bach study.

This is one Bach's most masterful academic 4-voice fugues. As with A minor from book one (see my previous post), the most common devices are canon and inversion, and here Bach delivers these in abundance: 2-voice non-inverted and inverted, one voice non-inverted against inverted and vice versa, etc., and then, at the end, two parallel double canons. Clearly there's genius at work, but it has the tendency to overwhelm the player and listener alike; a bit like the $200 burger topped with white truffles, caviar, and bonito. In spite of the finest, richest ingredients, it just doesn't taste very good. But my left hand got a great workout so whatever.

This is the penultimate fugue and recording of the WTC project. I saved the most profound for last. B Minor from book one coming up.

Yes, it took me 6 months to work up this 4-voice monster, the most challenging of the project by far. I even debated omitting it on the grounds that it's the one 'impossible' fugue of the 48. Impossible how? Well there's a merely improbable moment in the left hand at bar 74, but then there's the sustained pedal tone of the last 4.5 bars that cannot be played as notated on a manual keyboard instrument.

In the half-year struggle, my feelings evolved from self-resentment for procrastinating and leaving this beast to sour my attitude so near the end of the project--it is still far from my favorite fugue--to accepting that once again I was being taught an important lesson. Wherever its origin--scholars speculate that the fugue was originally written for organ and repurposed for the WTC--I'm fairly convinced Bach didn't pluck this fugue from some other existing repertoire just to fill the A minor fugue slot in the first book, but rather to add an additional dimension of challenge to the work. He put it there because it was impossible.

Speaking of the impossible… the page turns. No existing edition has managed to deal with them well because, quite simply, there aren't any good places for them. Except for 1 beat in bar 65, both hands are fully occupied throughout. Memorizing music this complex would have added another 6 months to the process at least, so I cheated and did the video in 3 cuts with 2 different camera angles. The microphone I use is attached to the camera, so apologies in advance for the subtle tempo change and not-so-subtle difference in the audio quality of the middle section.

#Bach #WTCPROJECT #DAVIDCARDON #bwv 865

In this installment of my disembodied hands playing the piano, I divert from the WTC to the Corrente of Partita VI, for no reason other than the last 3 fugues of the WTC Project are taking some time to shed and I needed something fast and fun to nimble me up.

#Bach #WTCPROJECT #bwv 830 #DAVIDCARDON

Dear Mother,

Here is the Brahms you requested. Thanks for the piano lessons and a childhood full of great music.

Happy Mother's Day.

Love,

David

#brahms #davidcardon #opus118 #intermezzo #piano

Bach, J.S.: Well-Tempered Clavier II Fugue VIII in D-sharp Minor, BWV 877

This is the kind of piece that requires you to slow down your heart rate in order to comprehend it… something I'm not particularly good at, but it was a worthwhile exercise! The long, introspective subject says a thousand things at once. Listen for chromaticism that is positively air-curling and completely marvelous. Truly one of the great, epic 4-voice fugues of the WTC.

#bwv877 #davidcardon #bach #wtcproject

Bach, J.S.: Well-Tempered Clavier I Fugue XXI in B-flat, BWV 866

I realized only after posting the last prelude that it marked a pretty significant milestone: all preludes from both books are finished! Only four fugues remain, unfortunately all of them massive and supremely difficult. Meanwhile, I've decided to dilute the intense and lengthy demystification process of these big final fugues with a few do-overs that were recorded during the early phase of this project, when it was an audio-only exercise.

The B-flat fugue from Book I has been a favorite since I worked it up the first time in March 2009. (Hard to believe it has been that long ago!) This is meat and potatoes Bach, with a Teutonic belly laugh of a subject and two jaunty countersubjects that tumble around each other for 48 bars. I had a lot of fun practicing it again and hope you enjoy it.

#bach #bwv866 #davidcardon #wtcproject

Bach, J.S.: Well-Tempered Clavier II Prelude XVII in A-flat, BWV 886

#bwv886 #davidcardon #bach

Bach, J.S.: Well-Tempered Clavier II Fugue XXIII in B, BWV 892

It took months for me to bond with this fugue. It's technically very difficult, but the more daunting challenge was the interpretation.

For me, it came down to simplicity vs complexity. The primary subject is the simplest thing, a rising 3rd, a falling 3rd, and a rising 6th (inverted 3rd), outlining an authentic cadence (I-IV-V-I), the most basic of all. Rhythmically, it couldn't be straighter: 7 half notes, no rests, no syncopation. It's the music of kindergarten. Or "Do Re Me" from The Sound of Music. In stark contrast, underneath and between the primary subjects, Bach weaves a haunting fugal tapestry of remote tonalities and rich harmonies. I felt an aspect of reminiscence to this music. (This is, after all, the last great 4-voice fugue of the two books.) I wanted to hear two dimensions, one distant, as if overheard from another room, and the other clear and in the foreground.

#bach #bvw892 #wtcproject

J.S. Bach: French Suite IV - Allemande, BWV 518

You couldn't be blamed for thinking I'd given up. I haven't, but it's clear I'm in the "last 5 pounds" phase of this project. Only the most daunting and difficult pieces remain. Meanwhile, here's an Allemande from one of the French suites that always makes me happy. No further explanation needed.

#bach #wtcproject #davidcardon #bwv518

Because I chose not to approach this project in chronological (or logical) order, I have spent a lot of time flipping through the books of the WTC over the last 2+ years, fishing for the next piece to tackle. This little prelude is one that I tended to flip past. Sandwiched between the prayerful (and approachable) A-flat Major fugue and its masterful 4-voice companion fugue, it looks like an underdog on the page. Difficult to imagine Bach himself invested much in it. But with only 5 pieces left in this project, I had to do it and found, not an underdog, but work of perfect contrapuntal economy.

Bach applied mathematical structure to his music and had a particular affinity for 3s. (Holy Trinity thing.) This is crazy, but here goes: G-sharp is the 9th of the 12 semitones. Divisble by 3. Naturally, it follows that the number of this prelude—18—is also divisible by 3. 18/3=6. It’s in a triple meter, 6/8. The subject consists of 9 notes and is stated 10 times right-side up, 5 times inverted. 15 is divisible by 3, and the ratio of subject to inversion is 2/3. The 9-note subject is then sliced into three 3-note chunks and used throughout, in various permutations, as episodic material and to underlie the subject. In the hands of your average serialist composer, mathematics like this would have been dehydrating, but this is Bach.

#bach #wtcproject #davidcardon #bwv863

Bach, J.S.: Well-Tempered Clavier II Fugue IV in C-sharp Minor, BWV 873

This technically hairy fugue from book two might on first hearing sound like Bach being a showoff. It’s a triple-meter dance at a nice clip, with a three voice subject, which Bach inverts a few times and truncates all over the place. Naturally there’s also a strong countersubject, this one deeply chromatic with long, slow note values. It’s a lament, looming in the background while the oblivious subjects dance. In effect, Gather ye rosebuds...

#bach #bwv873 #wtcproject #davidcardon

I wasn't sure at first what to make of this strange prelude, which is probably why I put if off for so long. But as with many of the lesser-known pieces in the WTC, the devil is in the details. Quite literally in this case. After a few weeks of practice, it finally occurred to me that Bach is playing with dissonance here, specifically the tritone interval, formerly known as The Devil in Music.

A tritone refers to two notes that are three whole tones apart from each other, i.e. C and F-sharp. It's hardly what we would consider dissonant or even unusual today, but The Devil in Music was specifically banned from sacred music by the Council of Trent in the mid-16th century. By the 1700s it had lost its taboo but retained the devilish connotation. Bach uses it a lot in his cantatas where the Devil makes an appearance.

In addition to the tritones all over this prelude, Bach adds those wicked gestures at the end of the main subject... think the devil's tail lashing the damned. (Use your 18th century imagination.) Long pedal trills and profuse ornamentation also have demonic connotations in Bach's music. They certainly tormented me!

#bach #wtcproject #bwv879 #davidcardon

Bach, J.S.: Well-Tempered Clavier I Fugue XIX in A, BWV 864

A lot of people find this to be one of the quirkier fugues in the WTC, but it's one of my favorites. The subject's unusual and long series of ascending 4ths proves to be rich fodder and inspires any number of textural options. Beethoven allegedly loved this fugue, and according to Czerny, played the first note of the subject fortissimo staccato followed by a piano legato finish. I've followed his lead on the fortissimo staccato first note, but preferred to remain staccato with the rest of the subject, adding some shape to that lovely, galant hop at the end.

#bach #bwv864 #davidcardon #wtcproject

Bach, J.S.: Well-Tempered Clavier II Prelude XXI in B-flat, BWV 890

#bach #WTCPROJECT #bwv890

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