Thus, much music and not only classical music is, and has been, harmonized melody. In other words, every step, every turn in a melodic line implies a harmony, and thus carries the same emotional content as harmonies. I keep wondering about discovery versus invention because it is as if these self-evident truths about music had existed in nature, waiting for someone to harness them. We shall never know. He did not invent the fugue, that most rule-governed device in music which requires the weaving of simultaneous melodic strands unfolding so they coincide in legitimate harmonies without losing their independence, all conforming to stringent structural patterns.
Nothing is more prone to becoming a mind game.
Nothing proved Bach s unique genius more conclusively than the sheer musical beauty he achieved in his fugues, so that intellectual appreciation of their inimitable mastery remains an optional extra. Inimitable the key word. Nothing tells the story more eloquently than the continuous study of his works in which the greatest masters of music engaged throughout their lives. Nothing tells the story more eloquently than the remarkable aspiration we encounter at the end of the lives of great composers to be worthy of Johann Sebastian Bach s company as they prepare to join him. The time for composing fugues ended even before Bach s death.