Resolving Tensions between Outer Form and Inner Form in Fugue: A Comparative Analysis of J. S. Bach’s Fugue in D minor (WTC I)

This study offers a comparative analysis of J. S. Bach’s Fugue in D minor, from the Well-Tempered Clavier Book I (WTC I). Detailed examination of multiple divergent readings of the same musical excerpts raises important questions about Schenkerian theory and its application to fugal textures. I suggest that analytical discrepancies arise primarily when voice-leading concerns are not completely disentangled from our deeply rooted views of formal design in fugue. In the end, an over-reliance on the details of outer form risks blocking access to the fugue’s inner form. I identify and resolve significant differences that emerge at the foreground in these readings, later considering how a combined view of formal design (outer form) and tonal structure (inner form) resolves ambiguities and enhances our understanding of the work as a whole. Volume 26, Number 3, September 2020 Copyright © 2020 Society for Music Theory [1] For the past several decades, Schenkerian theorists have examined the interaction between formal design and tonal structure extensively, focusing primarily on repertoire from the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.(1) With few exceptions, the fugal genre is notably absent from this discussion.(2) Reasons for this absence are surely varied, but one notable cause is that fugal textures intensify issues of voice-leading at the foreground level. Baroque fugues in particular— with their dense textures and lack of predictable phrase groupings—prevent theorists from making any sort of prediction about the tonal structure (Gauldin 2013, 223; C. Smith 1996, 272; Renwick 1995a, 205), and place considerable demands on the analyst (Renwick 1995a, 205; Schachter [1973] 1999). These complications, although not insurmountable, are perhaps one reason why the fugal genre has received less a ention than later tonal styles in the Schenkerian literature. As my study will show, a careful examination of the interaction between details of outer form and inner form raises interesting questions about Schenkerian theory and its application to fugues.(3) [2] Laurence Dreyfus, an outspoken critic of Schenkerian theory, notes the avoidance of the fugal genre in the Schenkerian literature and makes two specific points that directly relate to this study: [First], a Schenkerian analysis of a fugue is also of particular interest because the fugue, with its self-conscious manipulations of counterpoint, might not seem an obvious candidate for an approach oriented toward long-range voice-leading. (1996, 171) [Second], even orthodox Schenkerians will sometimes concede that Schenker does not “work well” in explicitly contrapuntal music such as fugues. This a itude is troubling. For if Schenker’s ideas, self-referential as they are, can only be challenged when socalled surface voice-leading like imitation and double counterpoint gets in the way, what guarantees that Schenker has not duped his readers when he analyzes Beethoven symphonies? (187) To the first point, modern-day theorists will undoubtedly agree that the surface “manipulations of counterpoint” in Bach’s fugues are extraordinary and certainly worthy of study. Yet this fact should not prohibit analysts from also exploring the tonal underpinnings of a fugal subject or how various tonal segments are introduced and connected across the span of an entire composition. As Jason Hooper writes: “The image of Schenker as Formenlehre antihero should not prevent us from continuing to uncover and clarify these ‘hidden’ relationships between outer form . . . and voiceleading structure” (2011, 61). The fact that Bach’s fugue subjects project tonal progressions allows us to explore how they connect at deeper structural levels (Schenker [1926] 2014; Renwick 1991, Renwick 1995a, Renwick 1995b; Schachter [1973] 1999; Hooper 2017), and I suggest that this view does not hinder, but rather heightens our ability to admire his inventive manipulation of motives at the musical surface. [3] Dreyfus centers on the idea of “intentionalism,” of “encouraging analytic results that might have pleased composers if they were told about them” (1996, 171). From this viewpoint, he suggests that a Schenkerian view of fugue tells us li le about the way Bach composed, that such an approach is historically unjustified, and that “it will always be easy to concoct such a voice-leading structure, especially when one insists on finding it” (187). Dreyfus is correct that there are many relevant and interesting features to study in a fugue’s formal design, and observing these details is the first step in analyzing any new work. But just as it is a mistake to claim that mere identification of surface counterpoint is the end goal in formal analysis, it is similarly misleading to claim that “concocting a voice-leading structure” is the primary venture for Schenkerian analysis. And, as the aforementioned studies suggest, still other important insights can be gleaned from careful observation of both formal design and tonal structure. Peter H. Smith defines this combined view as dimensional counterpoint, the “total structure that emerges through . . . thematic design, key scheme, and tonal structure” (2005, 32).(4) Whether or not a composer was fully aware of such connections should not restrict our ability as analysts to make those observations after the fact. To Dreyfus’s second point, I suggest that the theory can be applied successfully in fugal analysis, and I propose a more systematic approach where necessary. [4] The present study offers a comparative analysis of J. S. Bach’s Fugue in D minor, from the WellTempered Clavier Book I (WTC I). Through a detailed examination of published and unpublished sketches of this fugue, the first part of this paper identifies and resolves significant analytical differences that emerge at the foreground.(5) The second part of this paper considers how a combined view of formal design and tonal structure resolves ambiguities and enhances our understanding of the work as a whole. Because fugal analysis has not been thoroughly addressed in the Schenkerian literature, we do not currently have a systematic way for dealing with such dense, imitative textures.(6) This will become quite evident through the highly divergent readings of the same excerpts presented in this study. I suggest that these discrepancies arise primarily when voice-leading concerns are not completely disentangled from our deeply rooted views of formal design in fugue. In the end, an over-reliance on the details of outer form risks blocking access to the fugue’s inner form. Aspects of Foreground in J. S. Bach’s Fugue in D minor (WTC I) [5] The formal design of Bach’s Fugue in D minor (WTC I) is well documented. Numerous analysts have remarked on its two countersubject motives and have observed Bach’s frequent use of subject inversion and invertible counterpoint.(7) The fugue’s notable “rhyme” scheme—material that appears first in the key of the dominant in mm. 17–21 returns in the tonic at the end of the fugue in mm. 39–43—has led most analysts to view the fugue as a binary form.(8) Schenker, too, viewed the fugue in this way, as evident from the marginalia in his unpublished sketch, shown in Example 1. (9) The exposition’s subject entries are outlined in the upper left-hand corner of the page, and the bo om of the page outlines the fugue’s two-part design.(10) His formal analysis does not end there: Schenker also labels the subject (dux) and answer (comes) in his sketches. In Example 1, these markings appear between the first and second staves, third and fourth staves, and the fifth and sixth staves (circled); and the subject and answer are labeled throughout his published sketch from Free Composition ([1935] 1979), shown in Example 2. (Later appearances are labeled with the abbreviations “s” and “a” on the graph).(11) Schenker clearly saw the merits of identifying formal design features at the beginning stages of analysis, even if his final conclusions were drastically opposed to this viewpoint (Hooper 2011, 62). [6] Schenker’s, Peter Franck’s (2010), and Olli Väisälä’s (2011) middleground sketches of Bach’s Dminor Fugue contrast in several striking ways (Examples 2–4). In this article, I will focus on treatment of the fugue’s subject and answer (mm. 1–6), its modified and inverted subject entries (especially mm. 21–25), the rhyme scheme (mm. 17–21 and mm. 39–43), and select passages containing harmonic sequences (mm. 9–13, mm. 15–17, and mm. 28–34). There are certainly times when more than one plausible reading of the same work might result (Schachter [1990] 1999). The discrepancies here, however, seem to emerge not from different interpretations, but from a conflation of outer form and inner form constructs. The way these foreground details are analyzed has significant ramifications for the way we view the fugue’s large-scale structure.