Date of Award
2014
Document Type
Honors Thesis
Department
Music
First Advisor
Carlos Flores
Second Advisor
Trina Thompson
Abstract
A prominent feature among great composers is they often attempt to expand the boundaries of expectation and strive to discover fresh, new, and innovative styles. Throughout the musical periods, composers have established standard compositional forms; among these processes is the fugue. The specific goal of this project is to explore the compositional techniques of the 12-tone system developed by Arnold Schoenberg in 1921, and apply these techniques to fugal writing. In this process I am taking Bach’s fugue, BWV 847, and using it as a blueprint for my original 12-tone fugue. I follow the same overarching structural pattern of BWV 847—retaining the number of voices, related pitch selection and usage of the middle section, while submitting them to the paradigms of 12- tone serialism. I chose to employ techniques such as complex rhythmic patterns, pitch selection based on 20th century practices, and serial relationships that create the feeling of the traditional components of the fugue. This composition moves the fugue form in an unexpected and more progressive direction and attempts to give a meaningful definition to fugue writing with 12-tone principals.
Recommended Citation
Cady, Ilana Joyce, "A Composition Project: an Original 12-tone Fugue Modeled After J. S. Bach's BWV 847" (2014). Honors Theses. 101.
https://dx.doi.org/10.32597/honors/101/
https://digitalcommons.andrews.edu/honors/101
Subject Area
Fugue., Canons, fugues, etc.
Presentation Record URL
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.
DOI
https://dx.doi.org/10.32597/honors/101/
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