About the music

01. Toccata and Fugue in D minor

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The toccata is perhaps the most well-known work in the entire organ repertoire. Like many toccatas, it is probably a transcribed improvisation. It has been postulated that this was a test tune that Bach would play when trying out new organs. That would explain its crude character and the various hops between heavy chords and rapid melodic parts.

The fugue is written for four voices, and the subject resembles a passage in the toccata.

02. Ich ruf' zu dir, Herr Jesu Christ

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This is a chorale prelude from Orgelbüchlein. The chorale itself is a very simple melody, so the praxis is to embellish it with trills and other ornaments. Thus, my interpretation will be different from other recordings you may have heard.

This piece of music was featured in Tarkovsky's film Solaris.

03. Contrapunctus 1 from Die Kunst der Fuge

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Die Kunst der Fuge is a terribly clever suite of fourteen fugues and four canons, of increasing complexity, all based on the same theme. This is the first piece in the suite, so it is a comparatively simple four-part fugue.

04. Allein Gott in der Höh' sei Ehr'

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Bach has based at least ten different works on this melody (BWV numbers 662, 663, 664, 675, 676, 677, 711, 715, 716, 717), presumably quite varying in style and harmonic content. This version is a chorale prelude.

05. Passacaglia and Fugue in C minor

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The grand finale!

A passacaglia is based on a short melody which is repeated throughout the piece, mostly in the bass, sometimes with variations. In classical music, this type of prolonged repetition of a single theme is called an ostinato. In contemporary music, it's not called anything at all, because it is implied.

The fugue is quite advanced. The subject is the first half of the ostinato from the passacaglia. Everytime the subject sounds, two counter-subjects can also be heard (except in the very beginning of the fugue), while the fourth voice joins the others in free counterpoint. These four roles — playing the subject, playing the first counter-subject, playing the second counter-subject and playing free counterpoint — can be distributed among the four voices in 24 different permutations. This happens eleven times throughout the fugue, and Bach picks a different permutation every time according to a mathematical formula. Can you find it?