The word “fugue” lives a dual life, figuratively and literally. The lesser-known one, the second definition provided by Merriam Webster, is “a disturbed state of consciousness in which the one affected seems to perform acts in full awareness but upon recovery cannot recollect the acts performed.” I discovered this quite by accident. The originally-assumed title for this project was going to be “Re-New,” since I wanted to use reusable energy sources — very important to me — as the “program” lying just beneath the surface of the music. Unfortunately, a very similar title for a composition was already out there.

I had also decided that a “prelude and fugue” — a type of music composition very common from the Baroque period (and well beyond — I’ve used it several times already) — would be the over-arching form of the piece. I decided to search ‘Re-Fugue” as a title, and the “…disturbed state…” definition was the first hit to emerge. The irony of that definition, in the context of our seeming collective delusion over climate change and the tools available to us to address it, was decidedly not lost on me. Since I’d already started writing the piece, a simple renaming is all this discovery required.

Form

I’ve used no specific musical devices to represent the science here, just a general feel for the ideas. The prelude was written as a series of broad splotches of color, representing the renewable sources of energy that our planet has always had — our sun, our bodies of water, our natural subterranean heat sources. The fugue itself attempts to illustrate how these resources can be induced to emerge, serving our needs without much help from us, and avoiding the collateral damage that consuming non-renewable substances tend to give us. My fugue starts out quite traditionally — a theme which is repeated in different keys, and with a counter melody appearing first during the 2nd iteration. Although I’m pretty familiar with the Baroque pieces in this style, I didn’t stick with my original intent to take this piece close to those standards. The entire piece owes much to “fugue,” but it isn’t rigid in that approach.

Tonality

I started writing the fugue first, intending to use motivic materials appearing there to build the prelude afterward. The fugue itself has a theme which, using a series of key centers starting with D, rises by whole steps through the entire whole-tone scale to C, before falling back two half-steps to B♭. In typical fugue form, the theme repeats exactly, starting with this new key center. A 3rd repeat (starting with F♯) delivers us back to the original D. Although the fugue repetition continues, it begins to break down as new motivic material appears. (As you might have noticed, my approach is very mathematical, which will only take you so far before becoming strained, though the orchestration helps that a lot!)

Ensemble

As of this writing, I’m using two each of flutes (piccolo included), oboes, clarinets, bassoons, trumpets, and trombones. I’ve added a bass trombone as well. There are four French horns, two percussionists plus a timpanist, and full strings. (This is very close to the same ensemble I used for “September.”) As always, I’ve attempted to include a few new “faces” – besides the bass trombone, I’ve added crotales and a vibraphone to the percussion list.

As of this writing (September 22, 2026), I’ve just started. I’ll link excerpts as they come available.