Composition Lessons with Bach

Abstract

Composition Lessons with Bach Kevin Korsyn (bio) J. S. Bach's unfinished Air with Variations in C Minor BWV 991, from the 1722 Clavierbüchlein für Anna Magdalena Bach, consists of a sixteen-measure binary theme with two variations, all in different stages of incompleteness. Some scholars believe this fragmentary state was intentional, especially since the variations follow another unfinished work, the Fantasia in C Major BWV 573, in the manuscript. According to Peter Williams, "there does seem to be a teaching program of sorts here … four various 'cues' or 'models' for the student to continue."1 Whether or not Bach designed BWV 991 as a set of compositional exercises, it works well for this purpose. Here I will focus on the first variation (mm. 17–32), which consists of a single melodic line with no other voices, using it as the basis for a progressive series of projects in composition or improvisation suitable for an undergraduate course in eighteenth-century counterpoint. In project 1, students add a bass line entirely in eighth notes below the cantus firmus, while in project 2 they add a bass in constant sixteenth notes; these two assignments provide a transition from work students may have done in strict species counterpoint in the Fux tradition to more free types of composition. Project 3 is designed to sound more like "real" music, since students add two voices in free rhythms under the cantus firmus. All three tasks complement previous training in figured bass. Instead of working upward from a given bass, now they work from a given upper voice. The music for variation 1 is shown in example 1; I have renumbered the measures as 1–16 and will refer to this as the cantus firmus.2 Since the cantus firmus has two sections, an instructor could subdivide all three projects into two parts, so that students can get feedback after doing half the exercise. Why choose this as the basis for counterpoint projects? The most obvious answer is that if Williams is correct—and I think he is—Bach himself sanctioned it as a task for his students to complete. Even if this is true, however, one must still ask what Bach might have expected his students to learn by completing this fragment. I suspect the melody [End Page 227] was used because its varied rhythms and intervals pose a number of contrapuntal challenges within a relatively compact space. At the same time, however, there is an element of arbitrariness in any decision about what to include or omit in any curriculum, and there are probably dozens of other melodies that would work equally well. My pedagogical methods in this essay are eclectic, synthesizing a variety of models and sources, including some that would have been familiar to Bach, as well as more current approaches involving schemata, formal functions, and the recent revival of the partimento tradition.3 Thomas Attwood's records of his studies with Mozart also provided an important inspiration for projects 1 and 2. Mozart assigned an eight-measure melody to use for a series of exercises in writing bass diminutions; before Attwood was allowed to add any inner voices, he had to compose a series of increasingly intricate bass lines, starting with a skeletal line in mostly quarter notes, then doing one in constant eighth notes, and finally one in constant sixteenth notes. In my classes, I have found it helpful to discuss Mozart's meticulous corrections of Attwood's bass lines with students working on the Bach cantus firmus, despite some obvious stylistic differences between the two melodies.4 The oral nature [End Page 228] of contrapuntal pedagogy has left many gaps in the record. Mozart's criteria for evaluating Attwood's solutions, for example, are clear; less clear, however, are the instructions he might have given Attwood on how to create those solutions. My pedagogy here is an attempt to fill in those gaps in the oral record, while also preparing students for the more complex tasks of project 3. Project 1: Add a Bass in Eighth Notes below the Cantus Firmus Since "know thy cantus firmus" is the first commandment of working with given material, students should...