On the way to work, I listened on repeat to the prelude and fugue in f minor from Bach's Well Tempered Clavier, Book II. If I recall correctly, during the Baroque era, f minor was considered the most somber key. As Wikipedia has it: "Schubart described this key as 'Deep depression, funereal lament, groans of misery and longing for the grave.'" I don't know who Schubart is, but I like his description.
Bach's prelude and fugue in f minor elicit complex emotions in me. The pieces are upbeat, playful, and - with the prelude - almost silly. And yet I have the impression of impending or actual Doom.
The prelude, as I imagine it, portrays the eve of the end of the world. Two birds perched on a power line tweet at each other under an evil sky. The subject suffers bouts of denial and merry delusions interspersed with awakening realizations of immanent doom. As the prelude reaches its end, the subject gradually comes to face and accept his fate.
The fugue is the apocalypse itself. Each angel pours out his bowl of wrath in turn. Fire rains from heaven; oceans boil; the parched earth ignites; the bowels of the earth spew molten rock. God has brought his judgment and wrath upon the wicked world. Yet, there is a catharsis as the anticipated doom of the prelude actualizes. The end has come. The worst has arrived. The judgment has been delivered. The subject receives the privilege of seeing the world and his wicked self through the eyes and wisdom of God, and declares that God is just.
The theme of this piece, as it speaks to me, is the recognition of sin and evil within oneself and the wrath incurred, and the celebration of God's judgment and victory over evil. It is a call to repentance and sobriety, a call to acceptjust punishment due to one's evil actions.
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