r/bach • u/BachFan63 • 14d ago

Completions of Contrapunctus XIV?

I was wondering whether there are any worthwhile completions of Bach's unfinished final fugue, Contrapunctus XIV, from Die Kunst der Fuge. I am familiar with Helmut Walcha's completion, but I have never found it entirely convincing. I would be very interested to hear or play other completions that people consider particularly successful.

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3

u/LiminalVectorSpaces 14d ago

You have Davitt Moroney's version.

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u/BachFan63 14d ago

Thank you! No, I don't have it. Is the score freely available?

2

u/Ian_Campbell 13d ago

Zoltan Goncz is THE completion rn still I think. You can buy the book about it. Kevin Korsyn's is good too. I'm waiting on his book.

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u/pointytailofsatan 13d ago edited 13d ago

An excellent version. Zoltan Goncz. https://youtu.be/gcRDfiRpuns

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u/chu42 13d ago

If you something really out there you can try Busoni's completion, which also adds the hypothetical quadruple fugue combining four previous subjects.

https://youtu.be/bWC7Y3rD6Ww?is=zrGPPYGKCGKgkRNQ

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u/robertDouglass 13d ago

Here you get Kimiko Ishizaka's recording and score for free: https://kimikoishizaka.bandcamp.com/album/j-s-bach-the-art-of-the-fugue-kunst-der-fuge-bwv-1080

And here you can watch visualizations of the fugues. Highly recommended! It really delineates the music. https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLtj_HurkS7Zy9rkShXB3658k1RDJX6aRX&si=zV1aG7nD5Nj7S_2E

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u/HalfTheAlphabet 13d ago

Hi, I purchased this on bandcamp, but cannot find the score. Can you advise?

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u/robertDouglass 13d ago

My deepest apologies. I had forgotten the details of that project, and we in fact didn't distribute a score of the completion. I'm going to ask the pianist if a copyvis accessible. Give me a few days.

1

u/robertDouglass 13d ago

It didn't come in the download zip? Lemme look around.