Classical Music | Piano Music

Dmitry Shostakovich

Prelude and Fugue in B-flat Major, Op. 87, No. 21  Play

Pieter Grobler Piano

Recorded on 08/07/2013, uploaded on 04/01/2014

Musician's or Publisher's Notes

Inspired by the 1950 bicentennial commemoration of J.S. Bach’s death, Shostakovich completed the 24 Preludes and Fugues Op 87 in 1951 as a contemporary tribute to the Well Tempered Clavier. An unrelenting passage of sixteenth-notes continues directly into a strongly articulated and rhythmical fugue.  The fugue’s light-hearted main theme grows towards a climax, but Shostakovich carefully prevents this from happening, only giving way towards the end of the work, so that the fugue ends in a climactic fortissimo.     Pieter Grobler