Week 11 (1 Apr 2003): Engineering Aspects of Fugues

Guest lecture by Dennis Thurmond

1. Student summaries of the class.
   
   
2. References for today's lecture:
   
   
   • The Fugue at kunstderfuge.com (Based on Hugo Norden's Foundation Studies on Fugue)
   • Fugue at Indiana U.'s Aural Theory Review for Graduate Students
   
   
   
3. Class Examples from J.S.Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier Book I (MIDI files from virtualsheetmusic.com) compiled by Phillip Wu
   
   
   • Prelude No.1 in C
   • Fugue No.1 in C
   • Prelude No.2 in c
   • Fugue No.2 in c
   
   
   
4. Other Listening Exercises (from kunstderfuge.com) compiled by Yun-Ching Chen
   
   
   • J.S.Bach's Fugue No.12 in f, BWV 881, from the Well-Tempered Clavier Book II
   • Shostakovich's Fugue No.17 in Ab, Op.87
   • Robert G. Trussell's Swing Jazz Fugue on Lullaby of Birdland Theme by George Shearing
   
   
   
5. Assigned Readings (handed out in class)
   
   
   • Notes on
     Preludes, Levels of Description, and Computer Systems, and Ant Fugue p.275-336
     from "Godel, Escher, Bach: an Eternal Golden Braid" by Douglas Hofstadter
     
     
   • Notes on
     Metric Structure in "A Generative Theory of Tonal Music"
     by Lerdahl and Jackendoff (1983). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Dennis Thurmond, lecturer, keyboard studies, was formerly the chairman of the music synthesis department and class piano program at the Berklee College of Music and Teaching Fellow at MIT Center for Advanced Visual Studies. He is currently on the summer faculty at the Utrecht Conservatory in the Netherlands. Mr. Thurmond is a classical and jazz pianist and keyboard synthesist. His keyboard performance and technical background has included playing synthesizer for the Boston Pops, keyboards for the New York Vocal Jazz Ensemble, being production arranger for the Gospel Review for Symphony Orchestra with Della Reese and Billy Preston, studio pianist for the television series Party of Five and ROM card designer for Kawai Japan. He is a composer and technical consultant for the Music Thru MIDI series and co-composer of the Jazz SophistiCat Series for Alfred Publishing Co. He is a student of Stewart Gordon and Adele Marcus. He has toured Asia, Europe and the US.

Posted 1 Apr 2003.