Hmm.. so what are Cherubini's eight fugal essentials?

Cherubini's pronouncements can be found in his Treatise on Counterpoint and Fugue. This is available online at  http://www.scribd.com/doc/245637/Counterpoint-Fugue-Cherubini
and the substantive discussion of Fugue starts on p. 62.
Baz

All the devices that can be introduced into a fugue depend upon the knowledge, the skill, and the judgment of the composer, and, at the same time, upon the nature of the SUBJECT and of the COUNTER-SUBJECT which may offer more of less scope for these devices. These said devices consist, firstly, in the employment of imitations formed by detaching portions either of the SUBJECT or of the COUNTER-SUBJECT; secondly, in the transposition of the subject into different keys, and in the advantage which may be derived with respect to this from double counterpoints; thirdly, in the inversion of the SUBJECT by contrary movement; fourthly, in a new SUBJECT that may be introduced for combination with the first SUBJECT and the first COUNTER-SUBJECT; fifthly in the manner of combining the STRETTO in several ways, each time more and more closely approaching the RESPONSE to the SUBJECT; sixthly, in the means that may be employed to let the SUBJECT be heard simultaneously with its inversion by contrary movement; seventhly and lastly, in the method of combining the SUBJECT, the COUNTER-SUBJECT, and the STRETTO upon the pedal, and in the skill and taste with which these devices are brought in and worked throughout the extent of a fugue.

The indispensable conditions of a fugue are the subject, the response, the counter-subject; and the stretto. There may be added to these the pedal, which is almost always employed in a fugue of any extent.

In regard to the previous post we wonder whether there are to be found on the Internet any favourable reviews of Mr. Iron's indeed wayward man. It would be interesting to find out what if anything could be said in his favour.

Anybody happen to know what bizarre edition Leon Berben was playing from, for the Well-Tempered Clavier? Or is it just handfuls of questionable notes (sounding like a misreading of scores, especially in the area of accidentals missing) that the producer didn't catch for a retake? His performances here sound confident and fluent, and not like ornamentation or improvised details either, or like mere finger slips; but just like a case of learning the music too quickly and incompletely, sight-reading errors or producer's inattention.... Many of them are interesting interpretations, but I find myself on edge waiting for the next wrong notes to come up, in so many of them.

He sounds like a player I'd enjoy meeting, and hearing in concert...but I'd hope that the music is thoroughly learned before committing it to recording or concert. The beginning of the F# minor fugue, book 1, is one obvious place where it wasn't: there's are two or three extra beats inserted into the first appearance of the subject, during its final trill, with a huge rubato that doesn't sound deliberately planned. Then despite that slow and odd start, he burns through that whole fugue in 1'54", while my rendition takes 3'34" and Watchorn's is even more ruminative at 4'14". 3'49" for Glenn Gould.... At the least, Berben's rendition of this fugue is a shock to my neural system.

I'm no stranger to playing or enjoying alternate readings of the music; my own disc of WTC excerpts has one in the B major, and I documented in the booklet that I was using the alternate "alpha" reading that the NBA printed separately.... It just seems to me that the Brilliant set should tell us somewhere if the musicians are using an especially off-the-beaten-path version of the score.


http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Vocal/BWV250-438-Matt.htm