Hi everyone,

Sorry I have a bit of trouble uploading mp3's.

Here is my second submission piece.
A pageturner, entitled "Fugal Etude."
It is what it is, and that's all that it is.
Read along with the score!!!

http://www.jeremiahbornfield.com/?p=53

Enjoy!

Jeremiah

Hi Jeremiah,

I had a listen to your Fugal Etude. I'll start with what I like. Your fugal style is convincing, as what I hear seems to be in the polyphonic tradition. The syncopated articulations for example the top of the piece in the right hand playing on the "1 and" is interesting. And Lloyd Arriola played this with confidence and talent.

Now with what I think could be worked on. First of all, it says on the site:



So you haven't submitted an Mp3, just a link. You have music which is good, but would be nice to download. I would recommend posting future works in the comp section if you are simply going to link your work.

Feedback on your piece: I don't get the sense of any harmonic direction in your piece, We start at A and then go to C in measure eleven, an acceptable modulation but quickly to D in the next measure. It may work on some level.

Though I think what hangs me up about this piece is the phrases are super small. You might call them motifs, but even as motifs, you seem to have a new motive every few beats, which makes this piece seem to me like a good technical/ academic exercise, but not something that can move me in a way that some music by Chopin, Bergmuller and Granados among others can. Don't know what you were going for. If you were going for strictly academic piece then it has a some real value.

That's my two cents, best of luck,

~Riley

Hi Riley,

Thanks so much for having a listen to my little piece. For a few years I nearly excluded all music but imitative polyphony. Bach was god and Glenn Gould his son.

I'm glad that you noticed all of the motives. That is truly what this piece is about. If you look really hard you'll notice that all of the "subjects" ( you can't really call them this, because technically the piece is more of a canon than fugue) are played back to back in retrograde for the final statement, which comes after another harmonic shift... The shifts are not very ambiguous, basically going directly through the circle of fifths. I like the arpeggios breaking the dense counterpoint up a bit. As for the master composers you name, what wonderful work they did!

Thanks again,
JB