Hooray! I am at the end of the Well Tempered Clavier Book I, and tomorrow, August 1, I will begin WTCII.
And what an ending to the book — the P&F in B minor, BWV 869, a view of the 20th century, courtesy of Mr. Bach in 1722. The Prelude shows off a real, straight ahead jazz walking bass, and in the Fugue I count two subjects (a double fugue), the main one made out of all twelve tones used in western music (all the unique black and white keys on a piano), making Schoenberg and his Twelve Tone School sound almost wistfully old fashioned. After the second iteration of the subject, there is this nice feature in the upper voice immediately that I am calling the second subject, and it comes back verbatim in multiple keys, so that’s my argument for the double fugue. Further, this fugue has several instances of sequence — beautiful phrases that repeat in neighboring patterns. It’s another six-page fugue (it pays to have reinforced oneself with some caffeine) and it is glorious.
The image is of the beginning of the whole book, where I keep my summary of time periods during which I’ve read through the WTCI. It is always rewarding to write in the latest entry, as I did today.