The Art of Fugue reveals how J. S. Bach organized this amazing work. The theme, which is introduced in the first movement, is transformed and elaborated on in the same key in powerful and hypnotic ways until the climactic four-part final movement, which, in Bach’s original, ends abruptly in mid-line.
What happened to the remainder of the composition, if indeed it was written down, is unknown. The unfinished nature of this composition continues to spur musicological speculation.
Bach’s contemporaries concluded that The Art of Fugue was his final composition, but modern scholars believe that it may be an earlier work (likely completed in 1742) that Bach continued to tinker with and whose editing for publication was simply left unfinished upon his death.
Regardless of the extensive speculations, for me the music is astounding in its creativity and variety. The core theme emerges, disappears, and then keeps emerging again just as one would welcome an old friend.
Listen now to a world famous expert to illustrate this composition further:
