Geographical Fugue

The fugue from the geography for speaking chorus is a chant of Ernst Toch from the year 1930. The piece is the last sentence of a suite entitled " Spoken Music ." You tried using a variety of means to achieve musical effects through speech; in particular here the musical form of the fugue is transferred from the melodic aspect to the chanting.

The suite was first performed in 1930 during the Berlin Festival for contemporary music, and recorded on record. However, this absorption is lost, as well as the original notes. The manuscript was preserved. Originally, the piece was designed genuinely for reproduction by gramophone, so a real piece of New Objectivity " machine music ".

Subsidiaries used in the theme of the fugue different geographical concepts and perform or alienated their rhythm. Since a chant has no real melody, the musical effect of the piece is based only on rhythmic contrasts and the contrasting sound of speech sounds.

This fugue theme is sung by tenor, alto, soprano and bass last. In the text, the names of cities Málaga, Rimini, Brindisi, Athens, Nagasaki and Yokohama are also processed.

The choral piece is also available in an English version.

The rights in the German-speaking countries are the Mills Music Publishers in Berlin.

• Secular choral work
• Choral works from the 20th century