Page:Fugue by Ebenezer Prout.djvu/173

Chap. IX.] either of the subject (as at bar 27) or of some important figure of counterpoint (as at bars 16 and 20). Occasionally in old fugues, we meet with a full close in some related key just before the final stretto; but this is not to be recommended.

322. To what keys, and in what order, is it advisable to modulate in the middle section of a fugue? To this important question it is not possible to give more than a general answer. The rule given by the old theorists was that the modulations in a fugue should be confined to the nearly related keys. We quote Cherubini's remarks on this subject:—

323. We have quoted Cherubini somewhat fully, because it is well that students who are working for an examination should know what the old rules are; but when we come to apply to them the test of Bach's practice, we find that they will not hold water for a moment. In the whole of the 'Forty-Eight,' there is not one single fugue in which the order of modulation prescribed by Cherubini is observed. What is even more to the point—in the 'Art of Fugue,' a work written by Bach, to show the proper method of fugal construction, we also find no fugue written on Cherubini's plan.

324. Besides this, we find that Bach, though he generally keeps within the circle of nearly-related keys, has no hesitation about going into unrelated keys when he has a mind to. No. 4 of the 'Art of Fugue,' the key of which is D minor, contains a modulation to B minor. In the fugue in E minor (No. 10 of the 'Forty-Eight') there is at bar 30 an entry of the subject in D minor; and in the fugue in A flat (No. 41 of the same work), we see at bar 32 an entry in E flat minor. The great organ fugue in D contains entries in C sharp minor and E major, and the organ fugue in B minor has an entry in C sharp minor. It is quite clear, either that Bach did not know how to write fugues properly, or that the old rules need altering. Of course we choose the latter alternative.

325. The rules as to the course of modulation and the middle entries in fugues which we deduce from Bach's works, are as follows:—

I. It is best in general to keep within the circle of