Upcoming Events of the SeventvSixth Season of The William

Nelson Cromwell and F. Lammot

Belin CConcerts

Unless otherwise noted, all programs

take place in the West Building,

West Garden Court.

Inscape Chamber Orchestra

Featuring Saint-Saens’s Carnival of

theAnimals, with new verses by

Marc BamuthiJoseph, and Mahler’s

Symphony no. 4, chamber version

April 22, 3:30

The Westerlies

The Songs We Sang: American Vocal

Music of the 20th Century

In celebration ofInternationalJazz Day,

the Westerlies premiere four pieces by

Duke Ellington adapted for brass quartet.

April 29, 3:30

Julia Bullock, soprano

John Arida, piano

Music by Schubert, Barber, Faure,

and more

May 6, 3:30

Ranky Tanky

Celebrating Outliers andAmerican

VanguardArt

May 13, 3:30

Christina and Michelle Naughton

Piano music by Mozart, Schubert,

Bolcom, Bach/Kurtag, Debussy,

Chopin, and Lutoslawski

May 20, 3:30

Admission to the National Gallery ofArt

and all of its programs is free of charge,

except as noted.

The use of cameras or recording equipment during the performance is not

allowed. Please be sure that all portable

electronic devices are turned off.

I he department of music produced

these program notes. Copyright © 2018

Board ofTrustees, National Gallery of

Art, Washington

Concerts are made possible in part

through the generosity of donors to

the National Gallery ofArt through

The Circle. Reserved seating is available

in recognition of their support. Please 

contact the development office at 

(202) 842-6450 or circle@nga.gov for

more information.

Cover Arthur L. Flory, Blossoms (detail),

1962, National Gallery ofArt, Washington, Rosenwald Collection

nga.gov/music

76TH SEASON OF CONCERTS

APRIL 15, 2018 / NATIONAL GALLERY OF ART
Program

Fretwork

Asako Morikawa, viola da gamba

Sam Stadlen, viola da gamba

Emily Ashton, baroque cello and viola da gamba

Richard Boothby, viola da gamba

William Hunt, viol

APRIL 15, 2018/3:30

WEST BUILDING, WEST GARDEN COURT

Alexander Goehr (b. 1932)

Fantasia 1

Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)

Die Kunst der Fuge (TheArt ofFugue)

Contrapunctus 1

Contrapunctus 2

Contrapunctus 3

Contrapunctus 4

Contrapunctus 5

Contrapunctus 6

Intermission

Alexander Goehr

Fantasia 2

Johann Sebastian Bach

Die Kunst der Fuge

Contrapunctus 7

Contrapunctus 8

Contrapunctus 9

Contrapunctus 10

Contrapunctus n

Contrapunctus 14

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The Ensemble

This year Fretwork will celebrate thirty years of performing music old and new and 

looks forward to a challenging and exciting future as the world’s leading consort of

viols. In these last two and a half decades, Fretwork has explored the core repertory

of great English consort music from Taverner to Purcell. The group’s earlier series

of discs for Virgin Classics included recordings devoted to Henry Purcell, William

Byrd,John Dowland, and Orlando Gibbons, while their more recent work for Harmonia

Mundi has produced two exuberantly praised recordings ofJ.S. Bach,Hrt ofFugue and 

Alio Modo, and recordings of Ottaviano Petrucci, SirJohn havener, and two collaborations with the choir ofMagdalen College, Oxford.

Fretwork has become known as the pioneer of contemporary music for viols,

having commissioned over forty new works from composers such as SirJohn

havener, Elvis Costello, Alexander Goehr,John Woolrich, Tan Dun, and Poul

Ruders, among others.

Fretwork frequently tours North America and has won particular praise for its

“Birds on Fire” program ofJewish music for viols. The group’s recording Birds on Fire

was Editor’s Choice in Gramophone Magazine, with Julie-Anne Sadie commenting, “T his

is demanding, wonderfully offbeat music inspired by Ashkenazi Klezmer (more cabaret

than camera), which Fretwork brings offwith a panache that astonishes and delights.”

Another major area of interest for the ensemble isJ.S. Bach. Initially, the group

performed and recorded TheArt ofFugue to rapturous notices and more recently has

arranged many of Bach’s keyboard works, including The Well-Tempered Clavier, the

Goldberg Variations, and the Clavieriihung, which have been released on the Harmonia

Mundi label.

Fretwork has toured Russia, Spain, France, and Ireland, with visits to the

Edinburgh, Fufthansa, Spitalfields, and Aldeburgh Festivals. As part of a residency

at Sidney Sussex College, the ensemble took part in a Festival of Evensong at five

Cambridge Colleges: King’s, Trinity, St.John’s, Gonville, and Caisus, as well as at

Sidney Sussex, which also included a recording ofThomas Tomkins.

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Program Notes

Die Kunst der Fuge (TheArt ofFugue) is Johann Sebastian Bach’s last major work, 

though, as we shall see, he certainly didn’t die before being able to complete it.

It survives in an autograph manuscript and in print a year after his death, in 1751.

It is unique in form and intent. While the Well-Tempered Clavier deals with

preludes and fugues in all the possible keys, theArt ofFugue remains in D minor

throughout. And while the Well-Tempered Clavier employs a new theme for each 

prelude and fugue, the Art ofFugue deals with just one theme that binds all its

movements together.

We don’t know Bach’s purpose in writing the work. It seems like a demonstration

of his skill in contrapuntal writing; but the purpose also seems to go much further than

that, perhaps to show a whole world of expression within the confines and discipline

of counterpoint, or to sum up a lifetime of attention to this art, deeply unfashionable, 

with Bach as one ofthe few composers submitting to the rigors of counterpoint.

We also don’t know what instrument Bach wrote it for. Both manuscript and 

print editions are presented in open score; that is, with four separate staves, unlike

keyboard music, which has the parts condensed onto two staves. However, it was

common for contrapuntal keyboard music to be written that way, in order to illustrate the counterpoint. Most scholars now agree that the piece was conceived for

keyboard, either harpsichord, clavichord, or organ, as it is playable by two hands on 

a keyboard. However, that doesn’t mean that Bach intended the Art ofFugue to be

performed at all, or that he would have had any objection to it being performed on

other instruments. Indeed, it has been played by all sorts of ensembles, both strings

and wind, or mixtures of both. One advantage of a viol consort is that its range is

large enough that each line can usually be accommodated on a single instrument.

But another consideration is balance, and Fretwork employs five viols, making it 

possible to divide up a line to keep the music in an expressive part of the viol—also,

at the end ofseveral “contrapuncti” (fugues), Bach dramatically introduces a fifth

voice. Finally, the viol consort was the primary vehicle for the great tradition of

English contrapuntal music, and Bach would surely have appreciated that tradition,

were he to have known it.

The work consists of fourteen contrapuncti, all based on the original theme

in some form or other. The fugues become increasingly complex, and the original

theme is transformed and manipulated in ever more ingenious and expressive ways.

Also, new themes are incorporated as well, and then combined with the original tune.

In between these themes, Bach puts four canons, also using the original theme, and

these also increase in complexity, culminating in an extraordinary chromatic canon

moving at two different speeds and in two different directions.

4

Contrapuncti 12 and 13 are mirror fugues, which work in two ways: the original

and an exact mirror inversion, but are omitted here because they would require extra 

instruments to cope with their extended range. The first four contrapuncti form a unit

presenting the theme in its original version and in its inverted form. The manuscript

and printed versions differ in many ways, not least in the ordering of the fugues; for 

example, the manuscript has the order: 1, 3, 2, 4. But it is certain that Bach had a hand

in the printing ofthe work, as the printed version often reveals his expanded and later

thoughts, such as in the first contrapunctus, which has an extra five bars at the end in 

the print version.

It is wonderful to see the fantasy that went into the printing of this work.

Blank space is filled up with extraordinary flights of graphic fantasy. The end of

contrapunctus 4 looks like this:

Contrapunctus 5 sees a significant transformation of the theme: the falling thirds

are filled in with a dotted note, and this gives it fourteen notes, a significant number;

and both original and inverted versions are used simultaneously. Number 6 sees this

change taken a step further, giving us this newly transformed theme in both versions,

but now in two different speeds, all expressed as part of a French overture—“in Stylo 

Francese,” as it says in the print edition.

Number 7 takes this transformation a stage yet further with the new theme both

right way up and inverted, at three different speeds. This is another contrapunctus that

is considerably shorter in the manuscript, with twelve bars added at the beginning. Also,

like number 6, in the final bars, Bach dramatically adds a fifth voice, with a decorative

flourish that rounds off this section of the whole work.

Number 8 is one of the longest contrapuncti and the only one in three parts

throughout. It presents us with two entirely new themes before sneaking in the

original theme, heavily disguised with rests. It is also highly chromatic in a way that

breaks with the harmonic language we have become used to, giving it a much more

gallant feel, closer in spirit to the music of Bach’s son, Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach.

5
Number 9 sweeps away this equivocal chromaticism with the imperious and

virtuosic scales and roulades of yet another new theme. And here we have the

original theme, without alteration, without inversion, in only one speed binding

the rushing quavers together.

But number 10 takes us back to the more introverted world we left with number

8. Another new theme—beautifully mirrored in itself (rising semitone followed by 

a falling fourth, then falling semitone followed by a rising fourth)—is worked out

in twenty-two bars before the transformed original theme is introduced in “stretto,”

meaning that the new entries come sooner than they should, as if they were impatient to come in. We also hear this theme only in its inverted form. This contrapunctus is notable for the pairs of voices that join the theme, producing a creamy,

rich texture, again suggesting later musical styles.

Number 11 takes this further. We have the halting, broken-up version of the

original theme that we heard in number 8 as the opening tune, then an inversion

of the chromatic theme that opened number 8, which is treated to the most tortured

and intense chromatic harmony, before the first theme returns. Another theme is

then introduced, which whips up the intensity to almost hysterical proportions, Bach

pushing his counterpoint to the very limit.

The two mirror fugues, numbers 12 and 13, have been omitted, as mentioned

above. The final contrapunctus is labeled “Fuga a 3 soggetti” in the printed edition;

and it indeed has three themes, none of which is the original theme or a variant of it.

It is clear that we are returning to the pure contrapuntal style of the opening contrapunctus. The first theme is in long, slow notes, the second in flowing quavers, and 

the third in Bach’s signature “B AC H” (H is German nomenclature for B natural).

When all three of these themes are combined, the manuscript breaks off:

6

At this point, Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach has written in German: “NB in this 

fugue, where the name B A C H is Brough in the countersubject, the composer has died.”

However, either Carl Philipp Emanual is deliberately trying to mislead us

(unlikely), or he genuinely had no idea what was happening during the last few years 

of his father’s life, because, as we can see, the handwriting shows no signs ofinfirmity, 

still less is there any sign of eyesight problems: Bach’s writing is as firm, vigorous,

and certain as always. Calligraphic experts suggest that the writing is characteristic

of the last eight years of his life. And the watermarks for the paper also suggest an 

earlier date of 1730-1742.

The romantic idea of Bach struggling to complete his last magnum opus and

dying just before he managed to crown the achievement was, of course, started by 

Carl Philipp Emanuel’s note written on the manuscript. This proved to be absolutely

compelling and was accepted without comment. But in 1881, Gustav Nottebohm

discovered that the three subjects of this final fugue combined not only with themselves, but also with the original theme. And a recent PhD thesis suggested that Bach

deliberately left this work unfinished to encourage others to work out the “solution”

to its puzzle. Indra Nicholas Martindale Hughes established exactly how many bars 

were missing (forty-seven) and how the themes could be combined in the way suggested by Bach’s obituary: “This is the last work ofthe author, which contains all sorts 

of counterpoints and canons, on a single principal subject. His last illness prevented

him from completing his project of bringing the next-to-last fugue to completion

and working out the last one, which was to contain four themes and to have been

afterward inverted note for note in all four voices.”

Hughes didn’t complete all forty-seven bars, but showed how the themes combined. I was sufficiently inspired by his work to attempt to fill in the gaps he had left.

I made a few changes to his suggestions, feeling that we needed a longer pedal to

provide a sufficiently big finish to this enormous work. I liked the idea also ofsigning

the work off with BACH in the final bars. I stole a few moves from previous contrapuncti, number 5 in particular.

Program notes by Richard Boothby

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