The g minor Prelude shows Bach in full-blown Scriabin mode: trills as varied expressive, textural and generative instruments. On the piano, it’s possible to use a trill to radiantly generate an ambient sostenuto of home sonority, or a way of gauging kinetic energy, from the glacial and static to the floating and transcendent. The hurdy-gurdy ostinato is in itself a set of variable connections and disillusion, blossoming outwards and upwards or closing in upon itself. In the absence of dynamic suggestion, Bach relies upon our innate sense of balance and taste, especially in those episodes of snowballing 32nd note flourishes; the excitement builds inexorably, excitedly.
The fugue subject is an integral isotope; self-enclosed, counter-subject and episodic development circumscribed within the terse lexicon of the fuming syllables of the main subject.
My 96-episode archive, Everything We Need To Know About Playing The Piano We Learn From The Well-Tempered Clavier, is now available at a special introductory rate of $20 for the first month of 10 episodes (that’s 2 /1/2 hours of material on the first 5 Preludes & Fugues), with at least 10 more episodes a month thereafter.
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