Yes - several (since mention of my name implies being asked). There a double one towards the close of my Variations and Fugue on a theme of Grieg, for piano (though it doesn't see itself through to what would probably be thought of as a proper fugal conclusion), a triple one in the final of my String Quintet (albeit ditto per Grieg Variations re its non-conclusion) and another double one in my organ piece Pansophiæ for John Ogdon (the first part of which is in six voices). There's another triple one in my Sequentia Claviensis for piano (the first of which is again in six voices) and, since Szymanowski has been mentioned earlier, one of the hardest I've ever written is towards the close of my Szymanowski-Etiud for 18 wind instruments. These last two are based on broken fragments from others' themes ("Faustian" ones in the first instance - Liszt's A Faust Symphony, Busoni's Doktor Faust and Quasi-Faust from Alkan's Grande Sonate), Op. 33 - and "Szymanowskian" ones in the second - shards from his three piano sonatas, etc.). The reason why the Symanowski one was so tricky to write is that it is a three-voice triple fugue in which all three sections run simultaneously - i.e. nine voices, of which 1, 4 and 7 have the first fugue subject, 2, 5 & 8 the second and 3, 6 & 9 the third, making a nine-voice exposition that was so exhausting that all semblance of fugue dissolves at the end of the exposition).

Advice to Richard (if I may make so bold); never write a fugue "if you life depends on it" - otherwise you might just risk ending up finding that your life may depend on doing it again aat some point...

Apparently, at the time when Boulez was between his first two piano sonatas, Dutilleux was working a fugues (albeit only at the privacy of his composition desk - none of us has since been party to the results)...

Best,

Alistair

You mean that each of these groups of three are playing in unison, or is there some part of the image I'm not getting?

I'd be strangely keen to hear that piece!

Please make this work available for study. I don't believe you did this. It's unprecedented. It's one thing to write 40-part counterpoint, another to write thematic/imitative counterpoint, yet another to continuously obey the rules and conventions of fugue.

Which rules of fugue writing did you keep intact? Intervals of entry? Overall harmonic and voice leading considerations? Metric restrictions?

You don't really have to answer any of that, nor do you really have to show me your score; I am just trying to express my flabbergastiture.

Also, martle, what is an atonal fugue in your book? Is it as difficult to write as a 'tonal' one? In general do people think writing a fugue in the style of Handel is harder or easier than writing one in the style of Schostakovich? I know that's a problematic question, but I believe the former is more difficult, since the rules are more well-established. Is this too simplistic? (I don't mean to imply that Schostakovich is atonal, but I do mean to imply that he doesn't mind rather quirky harmonies when the contrapuntal demands call for it, and that somehow gets subsumed into some notion of expressiveness. Also simplistic perhaps, but I'd be willing to elaborate)

An atonal fugue I know is Lutoslawski's for 13 strings. I don't find that a particularly good piece, but it is a fugue, and it is 'atonal'. Are there other notable examples?

Also, please explain a double ground bass: two bass lines going along at once? or alternating, like in 'double variations'?

Also, what does "well-hard" mean? Is it like Well-Tempered, or is it something naughty?

That's a nice new word! The score is available only as a photocopy; it's handwritten and has not been typeset.  I fear that I may have misled readers and should accordingly emphasise that the section of the piece concerned is really only a fugal exposition rather than a full-blown fugue, although given that it is in nine parts, it's not that short! That's about as much as I think I can answer (sorry!) usefully; anything more would need to come from a perusal of that part of the score.

Best,

Alistair

My thanks to Big Ron for expositing on the first of the two omissions (for which apologies) in my reply to CD. Exemplary!  (Sorry about the colloquialism, CD - we must always remember the truly international make-up of this forum!)
As for the other, I meant by 'double ground' a sequence of dyads rather than single notes, functioning nonetheless in a similar, often identical way to a conventional ground bass, or passacaglia. That's what I've always called this, although I'm more than happy to be corrected!

I like the idea of a counterpoint thread, C20th or otherwise!

CD, yes, in my piece the dyads are the same each time round, although often inverted and often added to; so it's a closed circuit.