| Description |
This study observes-from a Schenkerian perspective-the interaction of ascending lines and tonic prolongation in the expositions of J. S. Bach's fugues from The Well-Tempered Clavier. Chapter 1 begins by providing a brief review of major works dedicated to applying Heinrich Schenker's theories to fugue. William Renwick's 1995 book Analyzing Fugue: A Schenkerian Approach is a central focus, with particular regard to Renwick's work in identifying subject-answer paradigms that govern the underlying linear material of subject-answer pairs. While Renwick's paradigms provide an effective means for observing linear techniques in fugue, I favor Sarah Marlowe's modifications to Renwick's work as set forth in her 2013 dissertation "Fugue in Context: A Schenkerian Approach to Select Works by J. S. Bach and Dmitri Shostakovich." Marlowe more closely aligns the functional goals of Renwick's paradigms with Schenker's theories by focusing on the tonal-prolongational features of the paradigms in fugal expositions. Ultimately, Chapter 1 sets forth a new paradigm after Marlowe's modifications, which I propose as a replacement for Renwick's ascending Paradigm 5. Chapter 2 applies my modified paradigm to the expositions of the seven Paradigm 5 fugues originally identified by Renwick in Analyzing Fugue. The chapter provides foreground graphs for each fugue, as well as discussion of the means by which Paradigm 5 works to prolong tonic harmony. In Chapter 3, I apply my new Paradigm 5 as a tool in reclassifying the linear progressions of two additional Well-Tempered Clavier subjects. In iv this chapter, I test the merit of my modified paradigm as a more effective descriptor of linear content in the fugues than Renwick's original analyses. Chapter 4 widens the scope of the thesis to consider aspects of global structure, other ascending paradigms, and future research potential. In this chapter, I distinguish my Paradigm 5 linear progressions from that of Anstieg, and I propose modifications to the remaining ascending paradigms of Analyzing Fugue. I close by identifying key areas of Schenkerian fugal research to which the ideas of the thesis could be effectively applied. Ultimately, the study provides further evidence of the power that a Schenkerian methodology can have on fugal analysis. |
