Musical direction and the wedge in Beethoven's high comedy, Grosse Fuge op.

133
Author(s): STEPHEN HUSARIK
Source: The Musical Times, Vol. 153, No. 1920 (AUTUMN 2012), pp. 53-66
Published by: Musical Times Publications Ltd.
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 STEPHEN HUSARIK

Musical direction and the wedge in Beeth

high comedy, Grosse Fuge op. 133

Plaudite, amici, comoedia finita est

(Applaud, gentlemen, the comedy is finished)
Augustus

In addition to the various

acknowledgements in the
notes, I should like to thank
Carolyn Filipelli, Martha
Coleman and Sharon
Freeman and the staff of
the Boreham Library at the
University of Arkansas -
Fort Smith; Darren Rainey,
William Westcott, Thomas
Schleis, Tim Wall and Linda
Boyd; and Graham Hair for
the opportunity to present
a preliminary version of
this paper at the Glasgow
Caledonian University
'Anatomy of listening'
colloquium in September
2011.
listeners who heard it premiered by Schuppanzigh's string quartet in
IT listenersthetherooms
is rooms
of thewell who of known
Gesellschaft the heardonGesellschaft
der Musikfreunde thatandit premiered Ludwig der van Musikfreunde by Schuppanzigh's Beethoven's on Grosse 21 string March Fuge quartet 1826, baffled and in
21 March 1826,
that a critic of the Allgemeine Musikalische Zeitung later went so far as to
assess the work as 'incomprehensible, like Chinese'.1 Sitting in a nearby
restaurant, Beethoven's reaction was to call the first listeners 'cattle' and
'asses',2 suggesting that he thought they were incapable of ever gaining
sufficient musical education to understand it. He must have known that a
work such as this would require a special audience because he had already
remarked that the op. 59 quartets 'are not for you, but a later age ',3 and when
his friend Breuning also reported to him that this portion of op. 130 did not
please, he said, 'It will please them someday'.4
Beethoven was correct in his assessment. While early listeners and critics
had trouble understanding the Grosse Fuge , later musicians such as Igor
Stravinsky said it 'will be contemporary forever'.5 Glenn Gould thought
that it was 'just about the most astonishing work',6 and modern string
players consider Grosse Fuge the non plus ultra of their art. Nevertheless,
it has taken almost two centuries and more than 60 analyses to unscramble
certain musical aspects of this 'Chinese' puzzle. To date, no critical analysis
of Grosse Fuge has satisfactorily explained its compelling directionality, thus
leaving even modern listeners unfulfilled.
Previous analyses have identified Grosse Fuge as a series of successive
sections; this was the approach taken by d'Indy, Misch, Grew and others.7
Warren Kirkendale and Joseph Kerman went one step further in identifying

i. Lewis Lockwood: p.421. Solomon suggests companion , edd. Thomas K. Gould reader (New York,
Beethoven (New York, 2003),that the statement may be Scherman & Louis Biancolli 1984), p.458.
p.460. apocryphal. (Garden City, New York,
1972), p-989- 7. Ludwig Misch: ' Grosse
2. Wilhelm von Lenz: 3. Lockwood: Beethoven , Fuge in B flat for string
Beethoven: eine Kunststudie , P-312- 5. Igor Stravinsky & Robert quartet', in The Beethoven
5 vols (Kassel, 1855-60), Craft: Dialogues and a diary companion , pp.1013- 16;
vol.2, pp.21 8-1 9, quoted 4. Arthur Shepherd: 'String (New York, 1963), p.24. Joseph de Marliave:
in Maynard Solomon: Quartet no. 13 in B flat, Beethoven s quartets (New
Beethoven (New York, 1998), opus 130', in The Beethoven 6. Tim Page: The Glenn York, 1972), pp.293-95.

THE MUSICAL TIMES Autumn 2012 53

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54 Musical direction and the wedge in Beethovens high comedy , Grosse Fuge op. 133
8. Warren Kirkendale:
'The "Great fugue" op.133:
Beethoven's "Art of fugue" ',
in Acta Musicologica vol.35
no. i (January- March 1963),
pp. 14-24.
9. Joseph Kerman: The
Beethoven quartets (New
York, 1966), p.270.
10. Warren Kirkendale:
Fugue and fugato in rococo
and classical chamber music,
second edition (Durham,
NC, 1979), p.263.
h. Kirkendale: 'The "Great
fugue" ',p.i7.
12. Alexander Wheelock
Thayer: Ludwig van
Beethovens Lehen (Leipzig,
1908-17), trans. & edd.
Forbes, Elliot, Dieters,
Hermann, Riemann, Hugo,
Krehbiel & Edward as Life
of Beethoven (Princeton,
1967), p.692.
13. CD: Antonn Rej cha: 36
fug pro klavr , Jaroslav Tuma
(piano), ARTA F10146 2HP
(2006), liner notes.
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the work as a cantus firmus fugue - which helped explain its sense of unity
but not necessarily its overall sense of direction and closure.8 Kerman
(along with Phillip Radcliffe) added more to the conversation in terms of
thematic transformation: 'more impressively than any other fugue [...] this
one exploits a "device" which Bach barely knew about but which Beethoven
knew very well: the projection of the subject into the form'.9
Kirkendale brilliantly identified the origin of the peculiar rhythm of
the opening Bb Fuga in a skill book by Beethoven's teacher, Theodor
Albrechtsberger, a discovery that remains a landmark in the history of
musical criticism.10 Nevertheless, Kirkendale 's work left something to be
desired in terms of how Grosse Fuge achieved a sense of forward progress.
He asserted that Beethoven wanted this work to represent a compendium
of techniques - his 'Art of the fugue'; he cited a remark by Beethoven
'to include all of them [fugai techniques] at once' to help justify this con-
clusion." Little more than a third of the entire Grosse Fuge is purely fugai,
however, and what remains is couched in homophony, or the galant style.
If this work demonstrated Beethoven's desire to show off all possible fugai
techniques in a single composition, then those techniques are compressed
into a minority of the work; even Kirkendale acknowledged that many of
the sections are hardly fugai at all. Thus, it appears that the distribution and
arrangement of the fugue and fugato sections within Grosse Fuge offer the
possibility for new criticism of this work.
In my student days I made dozens of [fugues ...] but [imagination] also
wishes to exert its privileges [...] and a new and really poetic element must
be introduced into the traditional form'.12 Beethoven's often quoted remark
suggests that he sought something beyond traditional fugue writing in
Grosse Fuge . While it is possible that he was referring to formal 'poetics' -
and those parallel traits are present in this work - his reference to a 'really
poetic element' suggests something more ambitious than an anthology
of fugai techniques, or one based upon Classical speech. The fact that a
large portion of the Grosse Fuge is not strictly fugai gives a clue as to what
Beethoven wanted - a sampling of fugai techniques couched in a musical
form with transformative properties and homophonic closure.
In certain respects, Grosse Fuge is a summary of the history of music
as Beethoven knew it, gradually shifting from a Baroque musical style in
which he had been carefully trained as a youth, towards a homophonic
galant style in which he had become a recognised master. After looking at
his friend Anton Reicha's 36 Fugues for Klavier , he is said to have remarked
4 the fugue is no longer a fugue'.13 He must have immediately recognised
that all of Reicha's fugues end homophonically - something rather atypical
of Baroque fugues. Indeed, one of the chief problems facing a fugue
composer in any era is how to end the piece. Any schoolchild can be trained
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14. Many academic
fugues of Johann George
Albrechtsberger cadence
rather abruptly and
inconveniently.
15. Kirkendale: Fugue and
fugato.
1 6. Paul Albert LaPrade:
'Beethoven's "op. 133, the
Grosse Fuge" ' an examination
of thematic material', in
Triangle vol.79 no.4 (1985),
pp. 1 6-1 7. Although LaPrade
published an article on the
compound nature of the
Grosse Fuge subject in 1985,
the idea of the wedge was
presented by this author
in 'Aspects of Beethoven's
Grosse Fuge' Music Theory
Seminar, University of Iowa
(Iowa City), 24 July 1978.
17. Kathryn Bailey: 'Berg's
aphoristic pieces', in The
Cambridge companion to
Berg , ed. Anthony Pople
(Cambridge, 1997). Bailey
applies the well-established
concept of the 'wedge ' to
the works of Alban Berg and
references others in music
theory who have used this
term back to the mid-1960s.
18. Charles Rosen confronted
a similar problem discussing
works by Beethoven and
Haydn when he wrote that
'which has no name in
musical terminology, which
we may call the rhythm of
melodic pattern': Rosen:
The classical style (New
York, 1972), p.409.
19. Tom Beghin & Sander M.
Goldberg, edd.: Haydn and
the performance of rhetoric
(Chicago & London, 2007).
Ex.i: Beethoven: Grosse Fuge ,
cantus firmus
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to construct an exposition, but completing a fugue contrapuntally takes
expertise.14 Beethoven's Grosse Fuge overcomes this problem by adopting
a principle of closure derived from the wedge shape of its principal subject
(cantus firmus), and also by bringing all three of its subjects (X, Y, and
Z, labels borrowed from Kirkendale) into an agreeable conclusion at the
end of the composition. One might say that Grosse Fuge is like an Ancient
Greek Classical comedy where dramatically opposing forces (i.e. the fugue
in Bl? and fugato in Gb) are presented, modified and brought into a happy or
comedic union at the end. The work becomes high comedy because of its
elevated style (i.e. 'Fuga'l techniques), its purposeful mutation of that style,
and because of what one writer called its 'excessive use of contrapuntal
artifices'.15
To date no one has made much of the wedge shape in the cantus firmus
(subject X, ex.i) even though that contour is a driving force behind the
Grosse Fuge . One author discusses the compound nature of the subject,
but does not describe its wedge shape converging upon the second degree
of the scale, followed by a cadence.16 This particular shape helps explain
a preoccupation for occursus in Grosse Fuge and also provides the model
for the intermediate and large scale characteristics of the work.17 It should
be mentioned that the intervals of the tune recall a segment from Gluck's
Dance of the blessed spirits'.
The cantus firmus (subject X) is presented in diminution and augmen-
tation, paraphrased and transformed throughout the fugue, and its first
six notes continually allude to the second degree of the scale. Such a
continuous drive to the second degree of the scale contributes to minor
mode obsessiveness as the subject is harmonised throughout the fugue.
Like the celebrated falling third motif of Beethoven's Symphony no. 5
(originally sketched out as a chain of thirds over the entire first movement),
Beethoven projects this wedge out into the form of Grosse Fuge to create
a composition far beyond what any Baroque composer attempted. In fact,
the resulting music goes beyond mere thematic transformation and one is
forced to adopt terminology from other fields (e.g. amplificado, hyper-
bole, abruptio, etc.) to label it adequately.18 Recent publications in the area
of Haydn's music and rhetoric have shed new light on the whole subject
of Classical music in Vienna - that the sounds we hear from the music
of that era are generated as much from the tradition of rhetoric taught in
schools (Quintilian etc.) as from a purely abstract manipulation of sounds.19
Some of the terms from that conversation may be worth borrowing when
THE MUSICAL TIMES Autumn 2012 55
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56 Musical direction and the wedge in Beethovens high comedy , Grosse Fuge op. 133
20. David B. Levy: ' "Ma
per beschleunigend":
notation and meaning in
ops. 13 3/ 134', in Beethoven
Forum vol.14 no.2 (Fall
2007), p. 135. The degree to
which Beethoven actually
knew about rhetorical
devices is a matter of debate.
Levy briefly mentions some
of the factors while citing
the writings of Warren and
Ursula Kirkendale. The
contents of Beethoven's
personal library and his
quotes from Latin suggest
that he had more than a
passing acquaintance with
rhetoric, even if he didn't
comb through Aristotle or
Quintilian for advice on
how to make his music more
persuasive.
21. Beethoven: Grosse Fuge
op.134, score for two pianos,
autograph manuscript (New
York, 1826), p. i.
22. Beethoven: Grosse Fuge ,
Autograph 9 sketches,
Harvard University, Edna
Loeb Library, original
collection in the Preussische
Staatsbibliothek, Berlin.
I am indebted to members
of the Loeb Library staff
for access to microfilms of
Beethoven's Autograph 9
sketches during a National
Endowment for Humanities
College Teacher's Fellowship
programme at Harvard
University in 1989, directed
by Lewis Lockwood.
23. Kirkendale: Fugue and
fugato. Gapping is one of
two common techniques
that Beethoven uses to
create syncopation in this
work. The other is rhythmic
displacement of subjects.
He uses both as elements to
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discussing Grosse Fuge simply because they identify features not currently
labelled in music theory.20
One can gain a clue about the meaning of the opening unison G octave in
Grosse Fuge from the way Beethoven transcribed it in his two-piano version
of the work, op.134.21 There, the octave is replaced with a tremolo sounding
somewhat like a spoon rapping on a glass to announce a speech. This
directs the listener's attention to the main subject of the fugue after the slow
'Cavatina' of the original Quartet op. 130. The subsequent 'Overtura' to the
fugue (or should one say comedy?) is a sampling of subject variants. Not
everything heard in the main body of Grosse Fuge occurs in its 'Overtura'
because Beethoven engages in a process of reverse variation, where theme(s)
appear in one form at the head of the piece and another in the conclusion.
The purest form of the cantus fir mus (Kirkendale, subject X) is not
presented at the outset in the 'Overtura'. Instead, its ending is punctuated
with a dotted rhythm and trill that becomes an important fig.Xa later in the
A'> fugue (see ex.2). As listeners, we are initially unaware of the reverse
variation process, since only Beethoven himself knew the purest form
of his cantus fir mus. What is heard in the 'Overtura' is a variation of a
simple eight-note cantus firmus Beethoven wrote into the margins of his
Autograph 9 sketchbooks many times (often without staves) as if to remind
himself of the shape of the tune rather than its specific pitches. Kerman
made note of this sketchbook obsession in his important analysis.22
One should keep in mind that one of the musical goals of Grosse Fuge
is to hear the cantus firmus unsyncopated (i.e. expressed in equal note
values) at the end in order to resolve certain long-range tensions. First-
time listeners are initially unaware that the cantus firmus is presented in a
special syncopated or 'gapped' version in the B'> Fuga and this results in an
unexpected surprise when it is joined by the second subject (Kirkendale,
subject Y) in poetic metre at bar 31 (see ex.3).23 Syncopation is semiotic
for humour and the mixture of wide leaps and poetic metrics here creates
a sense of comic confusion - almost as if Harlequin is jumping around in
front of us. Johann Fux's widely read Gradus ad parnassum (1725) associated
such leaps with 'present day excesses'. Beethoven knew Fux's treatise well
and the inclusion of such disjunct leaps in a fugue subject is suggestive of
the humorous license that he is taking.24
surprise the listener in his actually off the beat, so that the second subject joins the
late works. For example, when the music continues, first, listeners are confused
after he states the words 'vor listeners must mentally re- about the actual location of
Gott' in the last movement establish where the beat is the beat. This adds to the
of the Symphony no.9, there actually located. In the same comedic quality.
is a dramatic silence followed way, Beethoven begins the
by series of chords that seem Grosse Fuge off the beat, 24. Kirkendale: Fugue and
to be on the beat, but are so to speak, so that when fugato , p.123.
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 Ex.2: Beethoven: Grosse Fuge , cantus firmus (Kirkendale, subject X) in its first appearance showing fig.Xa
Ex.3: Beethoven: Grosse Fuge , second subject (Y) in diambic feet (diamb = short long, short long)
25. Kathleen Kuiper,
ed.: Merriam- Webster's
encyclopedia of literature
(Springfield, Massachusetts,
>995)> P-323-
26. Wayne M. Senner, Robin
Wallace & William Meredith:
The critical reception of
Beethoven 's compositions by
his German contemporaries,
vol.i (Lincoln, Nebraska, &
London, 1999), p.85.
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Together, the second subject (Y) and cantus firmus outline a Bb7 chord -
with two extreme notes of B'> and Ab that foreshadow the keynotes of the
two main fugues in the work. While subject Y follows the harmonic rhythm
and direction of the cantus firmus, it reads as poetic metre in diambic (two
sets) pentameter (five literary feet) and diambic tetrameter - a compound
heroic couplet that would sound awkward to musical ears accustomed to
regular periodic phrasing.25
Asymmetrical in its two parts, subject Y is related to classical speech as a
distich (one diambic line in pentameter followed by another in tetrameter).26
Iambs (short-long) have a poetic tradition associated with Ancient Greek
Classical comedy - and the opening of the Bb Fuga is musically comedic
with its abrupt non-periodic phrasing, extreme leaps, repetitive rhythms,
voice crossings and persistent loud dynamic level. The metrical phrasing of
the Y subject is preserved throughout the first fugue and every appearance
thereafter. In the final bars of Grosse Fuge , after the Y subject appears to
have been transformed into regular four-bar periodic phrasing, Beethoven
reiterates this unbalanced diambic pentameter/ tetrameter phrase structure
so that the listener is left up in the air - as in a rhythmic joke.
Despite the great textural variety and frequent shifting of emphasis from
one voice part to another, the initial Bb Fuga has the impact of single affect
THE MUSICAL TIMES Autumn 2012 57
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58 Musical direction and the wedge in Beethovens high comedy , Grosse Fuge op. 133
27. Characterising
Beethoven's music as
Harlequin is not a far-fetched
idea; he did so himself.
Schindler quotes Beethoven
as saying: 'you have the
Harlequin dancing in D flat
major', quoted in Anton
Felix Schindler: Beethoven as
I knew him , ed. Donald W.
McArdle & trans. Constance
S. Jolly (New York, 1972),
p.369.
28. Kerman: The Beethoven
quartets.
29. John M. Gingerich:
'Ignaz Schuppanzigh and
Beethoven's late quartets', in
The Musical Quarterly vol.93
nos.3-4 (Fall-Winter 2010),
PP-45_5I3-
30. Annette Richards:
'Haydn's London trios
and the rhetoric of the
grotesque ', in Haydn and the
performance of rhetoric , edd.
Beghin & Goldberg, pp.251-
80. In particular, Richards
talks about the influence
of rhetoric on the quartets
of Haydn and sees many
connections with got baroc ,
or Grotesque, on the music
of Haydn. Her discussion
about the got baroc could be
transferred almost word for
word to a discussion about
Beethoven's Grosse Fuge.
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owing to its unbroken metrics and syncopation lasting nearly five minutes -
almost as if Harlequin [Erlknig] is awkwardly dancing in front of us.27 The
addition of a triplet figure at bar 58 increases the density of the texture, so
that the filling in of gaps in the first subject at bar 1 1 1 only adds more clutter
of voices.28 The Bb Fuga of op. 133 stumbles forward in what is probably
the most relentless and humorous assertion of modal rhythms since 12th-
century Notre Dame organum.
Kirkendale observed that there is a tradition of fortissimo Baroque
fugue writing behind Grosse Fuge , but Beethoven carried this tradition to
an extreme and if the syncopation didn't suggest humour to its first-time
listeners, the sheer length of its first fugue at a loud dynamic level should
have suggested that a comic reference was afoot. Perhaps a tradition of
seriousness that developed around Beethoven's works prevented them from
being thought of in the context of high comedy; it is clear from the research
of John Gingerich that the 'Galitzin' quartets were advertised as models of
perfection and held up as serious 'classical' masterpieces - one of the earliest
references to the use of that term in music history.29 Listeners accustomed
to the galant style could easily have been confused by this amalgam of
Baroque and contemporary styles. But none of the voice parts in the first
fugue of Grosse Fuge is periodic in a galant sense and the non- vocal leaps
guarantee that voice crossings and double imagery will result. A first-time
listener, therefore, could rightfully ask if the Bb Fuga of Grosse Fuge is a
dance, a fugue or both.
Annette Richards discusses the concept of the grotesque in a way that
seems particularly apropos of Grosse Fuge? Although Richards's essay
concerns the got baroc in Haydn's music, virtually everything in her list of
musically grotesque characteristics applies to the B'> Fuga of Grosse Fuge :
grotesque melodic leaps, lavish ornament, syncopated dissonances, dotted
rhythms, odd key changes, minor mode obsessiveness, irregular phrase
lengths and especially the idea of double imagery that results from the
use of compound subjects. In the first Fuga, at least, Grosse Fuge is pure
grotesque comedy.
Beethoven's persistent rhythm in this section offers many opportun-
ities for otherwise unacceptably dissonant passages of music. At bar 44
an isolated dissonance of El? (from countersubject material) against a Bb
triad in open position sounds at best like a harsh, unresolved appoggiatura.
Such unresolved dissonances make the listener believe that Beethoven is
engaging in humorous wisecracks - even though these odd notes might be
reconciled in terms of the general harmonic flow of the fugue. As well,
voice parts follow each other in strict imitation (initially) and the distich
of metrical pattern is maintained throughout. Fugai counterpoint begins to
break down as pairs of voices gather and occasional homophonic passages
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 Ex.4: Grosse Fuge , 'Abruptio* (bars 657-62)
31. Baroque paintings often
appear as one thing from
a distance, but up close,
something quite different.
For example, Rubens's
Fall of the damned (in the
Alte Pinakothek Museum,
Munich) looks like an
incredibly dense texture
from a distance, but up close
everything in the painting is
clearly made up of arms, legs
and bodies of people falling
to Hell. The first fugue of
Beethoven's Grosse Fuge
creates a similar double-
image effect. One is forced
to ask whether this is a fugue
or simply a grotesque dance.
Only detailed listening
reveals the intricacies of the
counterpoint and the ultimate
musical pleasure of tracing
the shifting of emphasis from
one musical voice part to
another.
32. Misch (' Grosse Fuge'
p.1014) writes that the Bb
fugue and the Gl? fugato
present the two main themes
of Grosse Fuge.
33. Dietrich Bartel: Musica
poetica: musical-rhetorical
figures in German baroque
music (Lincoln, Nebraska, &
London, 1997), pp.167- 70.
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of appoggiaturas appear (bars 97-101) in slow harmonic rhythm. The Bb
Fuga is not always pure fugue, and these brief homophonic episodes hint at
an imminent textural transformation that will occur in Grosse Fuge .
Like a Baroque painting that spills out of its picture frame, the Bb Fuga
stumbles onto the key of Gb (bVI) as it exits into a homophonic Fugato.31
Chromatic third relations are Beethoven's strongest and most significant
form of key change - he even uses them to represent 'God' (e.g. 'Vor
Gott', just before the 'Turkish march' in the Symphony no.9) and typically
dramatises the common tone between key areas a third apart. In the last
movement of the Symphony no.9 (en<^ development, bars 529-35),
for example, the note F# is held while notes change around it in order to
modulate from B major to D major. But common tone connections are more
appropriate to homophonic than to contrapuntal music, and so Beethoven
avoids them in the two chromatic third relations of his Grosse Fuge (at bars
158 and 517).
Notwithstanding all of the above, the first two sections of this work
(Bb Fuga and Gb Fugato) are very distinct in the listener's mind by virtue
of their contrasting length, harmonic construction, texture and dramatic
differences in volume. If we flash forward to the end of the work, the
meaning of this separation becomes clear, when Beethoven reminds the
listener that these first two sections of Grosse Fuge contain the principal
themes (ex.4). By analogy two main players - Harlequin and Columbine
- have been engaged in a comedic conversation taking place with the ever-
present cantus firmus (subject X) over the course of this work.32
Modern theorists call this cyclic organisation; from an 18th-century
rhetorical perspective, however, it would be labelled 'abruptio'.33 Beethoven
employs it at the beginning of the final movement of his Symphony no.9; anc^
THE MUSICAL TIMES Autumn 2012 59
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6o Musical direction and the wedge in Beethovens high comedy , Grosse Fuge op. 133
Ex.5: Beethoven: Grosse Fuge , Gb Fugato subject, bars 159-163
34. Beethoven used the same
idea of multiplicity in the
second movement of his
Piano Sonata op. 1 1 1 , where
he subdivides a theme laden
with appoggiaturas out to the
Golden Section (identified
with a triple trill at bars
112- 13) and then brings
back the theme in the coda
accompanied by multiple
appoggiaturas. Hans von
Biilow noticed this chorus of
appoggiaturas in his edition
of the piano sonatas and
placed stems on all the voice
parts.
35. Kirkendale: Fugue and
fugato, p.94.
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here, at the end of Grosse Fuge , to recall fragments of the Bb Fuga and Gb
Fugato - as if to recognise and reject each of them. They are like opposing
characters in a comedy brought together in their orginal forms. If the
Bb Fuga is analogous to the angular movements of Harlequin from the
commedia dell'arte , then the Gb Fugato could be compared to Columbine
(little dove) from the same dramatic setting - in a more galant vein.
Accompanying all of it, the cantus firmus serves as a unifying figure.
Grosse Fugue progresses, section-by-section, contrasting and modifying
the antipodes of polyphonic fugue and homophonic Fugato until they are
eventually consolidated and transformed in the last 26 bars of the work.
Let us now flash back to the Gb Fugato (bar 159, ex.5). Whereas the Bb
Fuga is a study in syncopated counterpoint with occasional homophonic
references, the G b Fugato is basically a homophonic texture full of melodic
appoggiaturas supported by cantus firmus counterpoint. It marks the
beginning of homophonic or two-voiced material affecting nearly two
thirds of the Grosse Fuge . Beethoven shows his mastery of the double image
again by placing appoggiaturas within appoggiaturas at the end of this
Gb Fugato. As the quartet ensemble breaks into four-octave unison on the
closing figure (bars 221-26), selected bass notes are extended so that the
upper voices sound compound appoggiaturas on top of them. The effect
here is of great emotional depth because multiple layers are generating
appoggiaturas, or sigh motifs.34 What is more, this section introduces
dynamic curves - something more characteristic of the galant style than
Baroque fugue writing.
Grosse Fuge continues its transformational journey at bar 233 with a
homophonic march in Bb based upon a double diminution of the cantus
firmus. The march combines elements of both previous sections (including
fig.Xa), and the cantus firmus is now softened to metrical shorts and longs
in quavers and crotchets. It leads to the second fugue of Grosse Fuge in Ab -
based almost entirely upon the cantus firmus itself.
After a formal exposition, the Ab fugue presents a series of stretto entries
of figures derived from fig.Xa in the Overtura' This section becomes comic
when understood in the context of a remark Beethoven made to Schindler:
when Beethoven notated a fugue subject with the long penultimate note
and trill in a conversation book of 1823, Schindler explained: 'Beethoven
is ridiculing the stereotyped manner of those he called the "old imperial
composers".'35
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36. Grosse Fuge , Autograph
9, Book i, p.26, iov
(courtesy Edna Loeb
Library, Harvard University,
original in Preussischer
Staatsbibliothek, Berlin).
37. One can find examples
of large-scale contrary
motion (wedge) elsewhere in
Beethoven's music, such as in
the introduction to his Piano
Sonata in C minor op.in.
38. Bartel: Music poetica ,
pp.303-06.
39. Grosse Fuge , autograph
manuscript (Mus.ms aut.,
Artaria 215), folios 30-33',
Bibliotka Jagiellnska,
Krakw. Thanks are due to
Jadwiga Grzybowska and
the late Agnieszka Mietelska-
Ciepierska of the Bibliotka
Jagiellnska, Krakw,
Poland for access to this
manuscript (Artaria 215).
Ex.6: Beethoven:
Autograph 9, book
i, p.2 6, iov, staves
5 -6 (an early sketch
representing bars
377-86)
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Repeating these short figures over and over again in stretto holds
them up for ridicule in way that words could never achieve. But they are
cleverly constructed as both stereotyped trill figures and as appoggiaturas
- a treatment that furthers the goal of modifying traditional fugue writing
with homophony as Beethoven's musical transformation unfolds. The
trills extend up to bar 382 and introduce perhaps one of the most amazing
passages of comic hyperbole in music: a soprano line (decorated with trills
and extended from fig.Xa) descends a scale while the bass line rises in a
chain of ascending thirds sequentially over a stretch of 23 bars (377-404)
to arrive at Bl>, the second degree in the scale of this second Al ? fugue. If his
preliminary sketch in Autograph 9 is taken as evidence, Beethoven clearly
thought of these 23 bars as a large two-voiced version of the cantus firmus;
it outlines a giant wedge that converges onto the second degree of the scale
(ex.6).36
Beethoven did not simply vary the subject according to traditional fugai
procedures such as augmentation or double augmentation, but exaggerated
everything about the cantus firmus - including its shape and harmonic
implications - to a grotesque extreme over many bars.37 If one should not
apply the term 'hyperbole' (exaggeration) to this extreme form of musical
magnification, then 'thematic transformation' is the only other technique
reasonably applicable.38
At the meeting of these voices, Beethoven considered an alternative,
shorter version of Grosse Fuge as shown in ex.7. He had crossed out material
in his manuscript that leads directly from this point (bar 414) in Grosse Fuge
to the second march in Bb (bar 533). 39 What would Grosse Fuge have been
like if Beethoven had not added the two pages of material from bars 414-
532 to his published fugue? Its reconstruction may give insight into how
the key scheme of this work is organised. If the published bars 414-532
are removed and replaced with his connective measures shown in ex.7, the
overall key scheme of Grosse Fuge would appear as a converging wedge
shown in fig.i.
Sections in the home key of Bb alternate with sections in other keys that
are slowly rising to create an oblique wedge. It is clear that, at least in the
preliminary version of the work, Beethoven's key arrangement seems to have
been influenced by the contour of the cantus firmus. Ultimately deciding
THE MUSICAL TIMES Autumn 2012 6l
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62 Musical direction and the wedge in Beethovens high comedy , Grosse Fuge op. 133

Ex.7: Beethoven: Grosse Fuge , autograph manuscript (Artaria 215), transcription of deleted bridge, pp.55, 29', staves 6- 9

Fig.i: Beethoven:
Grosse Fuge , cut
version, showing
oblique occursus of
the key areas. The
published material
of bars 414-533 in
Eb and Ab has been
omitted from this
diagram.

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40. Donald Francis Tovey:
'Grand Fugue in B flat,
op. 133', in Essays in musical
analysis, vol.2: symphonies 2
(London, 1935), p.174.
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against this, he inserted several more pages of music in his autograph (Eb
and Ab sections, bars 414-533) that disrupted the simplicity of the key
arrangement but include amazing examples of thematic transformation in
both the X and Y subjects.
What do the 123 'final' added bars contain? Beethoven presents one of
his most potent compositional techniques - thematic transformation. He
converts the principal subject into a hideous parody of its original and
accompanies it with the second subject in an unsyncopated, grotesque
tarantella rhythm. While Beethoven is noted to have begun his technique
of thematic transformation with the theme of his 'Eroica' Symphony,
evidently this is the first example of the extravagant form of thematic
transformation that one finds in the works of later Romantic composers.
Subject X is grotesquely distorted in rhythm and subject Y is softened to
a dance-like tarantella. Like all of the music after the two main fugues of
Grosse Fuge , this section emphasises homophonic writing even though it
includes such contrapuntal devices as stretto and inversion. The transition
from aggressive contrapuntal to soothing homophonic textures is an
inherent part of the overall design of the Grosse Fuge . The former Gb
fugato subject (Z) returns in the new key of Ab major at bar 493 with
a transformed, arhythmic version of the Y subject now acting as homo-
phonic background filler, and the section ends with voice parts working
their way slowly through a chromatic third relation to the return of the Bb
march.
Beethoven marked the return of the march (bar 533) as coda' in his
Autograph 9 sketches. Donald Francis Tovey identified the same spot in
his analysis as well. Almost everything that follows is in the home key,
homophonic and rhapsodic.40 This label is misleading, however, because
the 'coda' temporarily ascends to A minor at bar 618, just before the return
to the Bb tonic - as one more step in the process of referencing the wedge-
shaped cantus firmus in overall form.
The rhapsody is also special in itself because Beethoven joins appog-
giaturas of subject Z to the second subject (Y). Unlike the opening fugue
of Grosse Fuge that tends to preserve four independent voices spread
across the sound spectrum, pairs of voices (bars 565- 631) are now com-
pressed into a narrow range and interlock with each other as if to mimic
the rhythm of the Y subject without its leaps. This is a far cry from the
grotesque opening of Grosse Fuge. Step by step Beethoven has reduced the
range, the aggressive rhythmic character and even the dynamic levels of
this transforming fugue in his musical journey from Baroque polyphony
to galant homophony. As well, the Baroque concept of single affect and
terrace dynamics gives way to a transformative and expressive use of
dynamic curve.
THE MUSICAL TIMES Autumn 2012 63
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64 Musical direction and the wedge in Beethovens high comedy , Grosse Fuge op. 133

41. Bartel: Musica
potica , p. 167. Beethoven
does a similar thing
in his Symphony no.9
and the Largo of his
'Hammerklavier' Sonata,
where he recalls themes
and textures from previous
movements and cuts them
short, as if to reject them.
Once again, there is no term
for this technique in music,
but in rhetoric it is called
'abruptio'.
After the rhapsody subsides, the two most important themes of the piece
return from the 'Overtura' in abruptio , as if to reject them.41 The cantus
fir mus (subject X) is heard in its original form from the beginning of Grosse
Fuge one last time and almost resolves (bar 686), except for the tiny bump
of fig.Xa on the end.
A characteristic of many Baroque fugues is to present a main theme one
last time over a pedal point, which Beethoven accomplishes in a series of
interlocking sequences. This is extended by a prolonged repetition of the
closing trills (bars 700-15) that mimic bars 407-12 from the Ab Fugue.
The humorous satire continues even in these seemingly innocuous trills
as Beethoven pokes gentle fun one more time at the 'old Imperial' fugue
composers by repeating the cadential trill figure eleven times in a row (bars
701-16).
In the final summary passage of Grosse Fuge , all three subjects are brought
into new rhythmic transformations (bars 716-33, ex.8). The Y subject is

Ex.8: Beethoven: Grosse Fuge (two-stave reduction), bars 716-33

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 Ex.9: Beethoven: Grosse
Fuge, bars 725-3 i,
transformed Gl> theme
42. Tovey: 'Grand Fugue',
P-75-
43. Kirkendale: Fugue and
fugato , p. 195.
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softened from its aggressive syncopated original into what Donald Francis
Tovey called seraphic sweetness',42 and is extended with a Gl? Fugato Z
theme now transformed into a ragged rhythm with filler chords to match
(ex.9). Harlequin and Columbine have thus joined hands (Y + Z).
The cantus fir mus (subject X) finds its ideal location in the bass voice,
and is now couched in regular periodic phrasing, with an extension slowly
cascading down a diatonic ii7 chord with neighbor notes to Bk Harmonising
the extension down a chain of thirds (Cmi7) helps resolve the prolonged
tension built up by this chromatic subject throughout the work. Further,
Beethoven has the last laugh on those such as Reicha who claim that 'subjects
in plainsong style are rarely successful and lack interest'.43 Spelled out in
augmentation as one note per bar, the cantus firmus seems particularly
fitting at this last triumphal moment of Grosse Fuge .
The ending sounds so natural that the listener is set up for a final joke.
Beethoven spells out the last eight bars of the piece in the metric of the
Y subject, or diambic pentameter. This parting reference to Greco-Roman
metrics is humorous for those who have perceived the transformation of
Grosse Fuge from Baroque fugue into a galant style because it feels as if,
somehow, a beat or measure of music is missing from the end of this work.
And why not have a joke at the end of a comedy? Why not have a
comedy that begins with the most provocative example of grotesque
music end with what one of the most famous critics of all time said was
'seraphic sweetness'? Opposing forces have been consolidated, and three
subjects have undergone transformation into an excellent agreement. The
'really poetic element' of Grosse Fuge has asserted itself both as a process of
continuous transition from fugue to fugato and a transformational wedge
projected into the musical form.
THE MUSICAL TIMES Autumn 2012 65
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66 Musical direction and the wedge in Beethovens high comedy ' Grosse Fuge op. 133

Since its premiere Grosse Fuge has always pleased those who are sensitive
enough to appreciate its inherent musical values, but two centuries later
listeners welcome Beethoven's assertion that It will please them someday',
because Grosse Fuge can now be understood as a form of musical high
comedy.

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