4 ms·

Being able to compose fugues well is notoriously difficult. Mozart was never able to. Beethoven on the other hand... https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grosse_F

Being able to compose fugues well is notoriously difficult. Mozart was never able to. Beethoven on the other hand... https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grosse_Fuge https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grosse_Fuge https://youtu.be/hUaziUz4jx0 https://youtu.be/hUaziUz4jx0

baruchel 1y ago
So you want to write a fugue? https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=8sogUjiqg2c https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=8sogUjiqg2c
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castillar76 1y ago
A music history prof in college described this as "the ultimate raised middle-finger to the audience — Beethoven at his most I'm-writing-for-me-only."
cynicalkane 1y ago
Mozart wrote several fugues considered very good, the most famous of which is the Kyrie from his Requiem, which is a double fugue to boot.
vouaobrasil 1y ago
Check out John Mortensen's YouTube channel. https://www.youtube.com/@cedarvillemusic/videos https://www.youtube.com/@cedarvillemusic/videos He can improvise fugues on the spot. A lot of earlier composers could do so as well because their training from the get-go was improvisation.
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vixen99 1y ago
I thought I would check out your comment against other opinions: " Mozart’s contact with the mastery of the German contrapuntal tradition opened a completely new musical horizon. He produced a number of stand-alone fugues, and this newly gained compositional skill helped to inform the creation of his final sublime orchestral masterpieces. Words simply can’t describe the jaw-dropping and breathtaking fugal display of quintuple invertible counterpoint in the final movement of the “Jupiter.” We should all listen to the Jupiter and decide for ourselves if 'Mozart was never able to'. https://interlude.hk/fugues-and-other-musical-charms-from-bach-to-shostakovich/ https://interlude.hk/fugues-and-other-musical-charms-from-ba...
jancsika 1y ago
> Mozart was never able to. * ending of the last movement of the Jupiter Symphony * Introitus of the Requiem (four-voice ricercare in the instruments, then cascading upward in SATB choral writing, both combined with an operatic-style accompaniment) Here's a mind-blowing one-- at the end of his String Quartet K. 387 in G major. This is a modified rondo-sonata form where the rising figure of the rondo theme-- normally just a simple, catchy, tune-- is actually the subject and answer of a fugue! I'm fairly certain Mozart is the only composer of his era to substitute a fugal exposition for the rondo theme in a modified rondo-sonata form[1]. Even more impressive, the 2nd theme is a different fugue which continues into the rondo theme for-- you guessed it-- a double fugue. All of this is so fast, effervescent and seamless that someone like OP could be forgiven for not even noticing the fugue. So now OP must ask-- how many other examples are there of Mozart subtly shifting into and out of first-rate Bach-like contrapuntal textures? It's a question Beethoven undoubtedly knew the answer to, at least for all the Mozart scores he could get his hands on. 1: Haydn has a great musical joke at the end of the so-called "Lark" quartet-- in the middle of a fast, old-school Rondo he switches to minor and plonks down a thick four voice fugal exposition and development against the fast-flowing figuration from earlier. It disappears as quickly as it came, like Carl Stalling but before the era of cartoons!
- IggleSniggle 1y ago
  It took me until my 40s to really enjoy Mozart. The thing is, if you approach it from the stodgy perspective of a "Classical Music Enthusiast" then it's easy to miss what's delightful about it, but if you aren't trained in listening to classical music, it's not that accessible. It's like that with a lot of jokes. If they don't make you grin and laugh, it's hard to "get" what's so special about them. Bach you can kinda just zone into and gradually uncover what's special (or not), and just keep uncovering, or fuguing out, or whatever. Mozart, the joke is here and gone, and if you missed it, the whole thing just kinda doesn't seem all that special. Like a joke, you can have the punchline explained to you, but it won't make it funny, and you'll question the taste of those who do. But if you find yourself grinning, you'll only find more things to grin at the more you listen. As a kid and young adult I kinda hated Mozart. I was really surprised when I started liking it, more and more, and now I can't get enough. That's been my experience with Mozart, anyway.
mykowebhn 1y ago
First, I did want to point out that my claim that "Mozart was never able to" didn't mean that I thought he wasn't able to compose fugues, rather I thought he wasn't able to compose fugues WELL--definite emphasis on "well". Second, what I mean by "composing a fugue well" is to be able compose a piece or movement whereby three or more, usually four, voices are heard in a contrapuntal, not harmonic, manner for an EXTENDED PERIOD OF TIME (i.e., maintaining this for many measures). I looked closely at some of the examples people brought up like the last movements of both the Jupiter Symphony and his String Quartet No. 14 and nowhere do I see 4 voices simultaneously acting contrapuntally for more than just a handful of bars. Mozart would often write a given voice contrapuntally, but would often quickly revert that voice to a harmonic function. If you look at measures 91 to 106 in the last mvt of Quartet No. 14, that writing is a joke if you say he can write fugally. The second violin, viola, and cello are all mainly serving a harmonic function; they're just playing chords. One part that might look truly fugal would be in measures 112 to 117, but that's just one small part and not extended, as in the great fugues of Bach and Beethoven. Measures 61 to 90 kind of look truly fugal, but he really only has 3 voices going contrapuntally here at any given time, not 4. Look at measures 63 until 68 where the cello is playing an extended rest, for example. Yes, Mozart wrote fugues. Did he write truly sophisticated, truly "fugal" fugues? I still think not.

baruchel 1y ago

So you want to write a fugue? https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=8sogUjiqg2c https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=8sogUjiqg2c

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castillar76 1y ago

A music history prof in college described this as "the ultimate raised middle-finger to the audience — Beethoven at his most I'm-writing-for-me-only."

cynicalkane 1y ago

Mozart wrote several fugues considered very good, the most famous of which is the Kyrie from his Requiem, which is a double fugue to boot.

vouaobrasil 1y ago

Check out John Mortensen's YouTube channel. https://www.youtube.com/@cedarvillemusic/videos https://www.youtube.com/@cedarvillemusic/videos He can improvise fugues on the spot. A lot of earlier composers could do so as well because their training from the get-go was improvisation.

deleted 1y ago

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vixen99 1y ago

I thought I would check out your comment against other opinions: " Mozart’s contact with the mastery of the German contrapuntal tradition opened a completely new musical horizon. He produced a number of stand-alone fugues, and this newly gained compositional skill helped to inform the creation of his final sublime orchestral masterpieces. Words simply can’t describe the jaw-dropping and breathtaking fugal display of quintuple invertible counterpoint in the final movement of the “Jupiter.” We should all listen to the Jupiter and decide for ourselves if 'Mozart was never able to'. https://interlude.hk/fugues-and-other-musical-charms-from-bach-to-shostakovich/ https://interlude.hk/fugues-and-other-musical-charms-from-ba...

jancsika 1y ago

> Mozart was never able to. * ending of the last movement of the Jupiter Symphony * Introitus of the Requiem (four-voice ricercare in the instruments, then cascading upward in SATB choral writing, both combined with an operatic-style accompaniment) Here's a mind-blowing one-- at the end of his String Quartet K. 387 in G major. This is a modified rondo-sonata form where the rising figure of the rondo theme-- normally just a simple, catchy, tune-- is actually the subject and answer of a fugue! I'm fairly certain Mozart is the only composer of his era to substitute a fugal exposition for the rondo theme in a modified rondo-sonata form[1]. Even more impressive, the 2nd theme is a different fugue which continues into the rondo theme for-- you guessed it-- a double fugue. All of this is so fast, effervescent and seamless that someone like OP could be forgiven for not even noticing the fugue. So now OP must ask-- how many other examples are there of Mozart subtly shifting into and out of first-rate Bach-like contrapuntal textures? It's a question Beethoven undoubtedly knew the answer to, at least for all the Mozart scores he could get his hands on. 1: Haydn has a great musical joke at the end of the so-called "Lark" quartet-- in the middle of a fast, old-school Rondo he switches to minor and plonks down a thick four voice fugal exposition and development against the fast-flowing figuration from earlier. It disappears as quickly as it came, like Carl Stalling but before the era of cartoons!

IggleSniggle 1y ago
It took me until my 40s to really enjoy Mozart. The thing is, if you approach it from the stodgy perspective of a "Classical Music Enthusiast" then it's easy to miss what's delightful about it, but if you aren't trained in listening to classical music, it's not that accessible. It's like that with a lot of jokes. If they don't make you grin and laugh, it's hard to "get" what's so special about them. Bach you can kinda just zone into and gradually uncover what's special (or not), and just keep uncovering, or fuguing out, or whatever. Mozart, the joke is here and gone, and if you missed it, the whole thing just kinda doesn't seem all that special. Like a joke, you can have the punchline explained to you, but it won't make it funny, and you'll question the taste of those who do. But if you find yourself grinning, you'll only find more things to grin at the more you listen. As a kid and young adult I kinda hated Mozart. I was really surprised when I started liking it, more and more, and now I can't get enough. That's been my experience with Mozart, anyway.

mykowebhn 1y ago

First, I did want to point out that my claim that "Mozart was never able to" didn't mean that I thought he wasn't able to compose fugues, rather I thought he wasn't able to compose fugues WELL--definite emphasis on "well". Second, what I mean by "composing a fugue well" is to be able compose a piece or movement whereby three or more, usually four, voices are heard in a contrapuntal, not harmonic, manner for an EXTENDED PERIOD OF TIME (i.e., maintaining this for many measures). I looked closely at some of the examples people brought up like the last movements of both the Jupiter Symphony and his String Quartet No. 14 and nowhere do I see 4 voices simultaneously acting contrapuntally for more than just a handful of bars. Mozart would often write a given voice contrapuntally, but would often quickly revert that voice to a harmonic function. If you look at measures 91 to 106 in the last mvt of Quartet No. 14, that writing is a joke if you say he can write fugally. The second violin, viola, and cello are all mainly serving a harmonic function; they're just playing chords. One part that might look truly fugal would be in measures 112 to 117, but that's just one small part and not extended, as in the great fugues of Bach and Beethoven. Measures 61 to 90 kind of look truly fugal, but he really only has 3 voices going contrapuntally here at any given time, not 4. Look at measures 63 until 68 where the cello is playing an extended rest, for example. Yes, Mozart wrote fugues. Did he write truly sophisticated, truly "fugal" fugues? I still think not.