nokia fugue (op. 32):
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
download the scoreI have always had an appreciation for contrapuntal writing. I started learning about fugues during my early-teens and have been fascinated by Bach’s tremendous output of them. Having started posting videos on YouTube, I thought combining the idea of fugue with something from popular culture be an interesting and unique way of getting more attention for my channel, so I composed the Nokia Fugue in Summer of 2008.
A little while back, I had gotten in touch with Stephen Malinowski, a composer/arranger with quite a following in online communities. More importantly, he is known for his Music Animation Machine, a software he had pioneered, which depicts music notation as scrolling rectangles. After doing a wonderful animation on my Intermezzo II (Op. 28, No. 2), he kindly offered to do one on my Nokia Fugue. And from that point, my channel started getting much more attention. So I guess what I'm trying to say is: Thanks!
stretto discovery
The Nokia Fugue follows the standard fugue form with the exposition, episodic material, and coda.It is a three-part fugue that demonstrates the use of stretto, inversion, and inverted stretto.
Writing a good fugue from scratch is already pretty darn hard. Writing a fugue based on an existing theme also presents its challenges. Being an enthusiast of strict-counterpoint, I always try hard to work a good stretto into a fugue. In this case, the challenege is to discover a stretto and I came across this entirely by chance.
The first stretto appears after the exposition (around 0:26). It is heard in a minor tonality and the first two entries are separated by an octave. Strangely, the third entry differs by a minor-second above when the separation interval is considered in closed form. I came across this realization by trial and error.
The second stretto occurs at 1:03. The first two entries again are separated by an octave, but this time the third entry differs by a major second above. I was thrilled to have come across this second realization.