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Passacaglia and Fugue in C minor, BWV 582

171212 min

This guide follows Bach’s Passacaglia and Fugue in C minor, BWV 582 (1712) in two parts: Passacaglia (theme and variations) and Fuga (fugue).

Recording: Reitze Smits (organ) (2013)

I Passacaglia · Theme and variations · 21 sections

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AnalysisComments
  1. I · Theme and variations
  2. II · Fugue
ITheme and variations0:00–7:21

The is an eight- bass line heard alone on the pedals, and the timeline marks a new every eight , from 1 to 20. 12 is where most scholars place the . Later the leaves the pedals and moves to the upper voices, then to the feet beneath a dizzying run of semiquavers. Notice how the pattern stays the same while the around it keeps changing.

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IIFugue7:26–12:22

The fugue grows from the : its is the first half of the . After the opening and of the , Episodes (passages without the ) separate the , and the gaps grow longer, from one to three at first to seven to thirteen later, as the music moves into E-flat major and B-flat major. A countersubject again and again. The closes the fugue.

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Section boundaries in music are not always sharp; a transition may be felt over a pause or a held chord.

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HaydnString Quartet in D major, Op. 20 No. 41772HaydnString Quartet in E-flat major, Op. 33 No. 21781HaydnString Quartet in G major, Op. 33 No. 51781HaydnSymphony No. 81 in G major, Hob. I:811784HaydnSymphony No. 82 in C major, Hob. I:821786HaydnSymphony No. 88 in G major, Hob. I:881787HaydnPiano Sonata in C major, Hob. XVI:481789HaydnPiano Sonata in E-flat major, Hob. XVI:491790HaydnSymphony No. 94 in G major, Hob. I:941791HaydnAndante with Variations in F minor, Hob. XVII:61793

In listening paths

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Path 11

Variations and fugue

Two ways of making much from little: a theme changed again and again, and a subject passed from voice to voice.

Bach → Mozart → Beethoven → Mendelssohn → Brahms → Elgar

9 works · 2 h 37 min

In the catalog

Johann Sebastian BachOrganBaroque periodC minorTheme and variationsFugue

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