Die Kunst der Fuge, Contrapunctus XV - Canon per Augmentationem in Contrario Motu
Johann Sebastian Bach (1750)
Description
Its title, canon by augmentation in contrary motion, names the device: the following voice chases the leading voice's melody turned upside down and with every note doubled in length. Of the four canons in The Art of Fugue, Bach's late exploration of a single subject published in 1751, this is the one built on augmentation. This site lists it as Contrapunctus XV.
In D minor and 2/2, it is written in two voices: while one moves in quick notes, the other walks through the same melody inverted and stretched out. Because the note lengths differ, the voices drift apart, and partway through they swap roles and start afresh. It has 1,374 notes in 263 seconds, and its range runs from B1 to D6, the lowest note one below the left end of a 61-key keyboard.
Rated advanced. It takes concentration to sustain two lines moving at different speeds. Tell the quick voice from the stretched one with the hand colours, and practise passages isolated with the A-B loop at a reduced playback speed. Checking in the score view how the melody reappears inverted and at double length brings the structure into view.
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About the Composer
Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)
Johann Sebastian Bach was the towering figure of German Baroque music, serving for decades as Cantor of St. Thomas Church in Leipzig. Renowned for his mastery of counterpoint, he laid the foundations of keyboard music with works such as The Well-Tempered Clavier and the Inventions. This site includes minuets and polonaises from the Notebook for Anna Magdalena Bach, the Inventions and Sinfonias, and fugues from The Well-Tempered Clavier. The Notebook pieces are catalogued with BWV Anh. (appendix) numbers, but many are by other composers - Petzold's minuets among them - or by no one known, and most of their song pages give the current view of who wrote them.
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