Hess 64 – Fugue in C Major for Piano. Composed around 1794, it was published with revisions and explanatory notes by A.E.F. Dickinson in London’s Musical Times in February 1955, and later in Mainz’s Musik im Unterricht in November 1955; it was then published again in London by Williams, edited by Jack Werner in 1956, and more recently by Willy Hess in the ninth issue of Supplemente zur GA, in 1965.

The official title is WoO 215 Three-voice Fugue (C major) for Piano. Dedication: -NGAVII/6 AGA-SBG IX/9 (Hess 64).

The original manuscript, which contains some uncertainties, cancellations, and even a few scribbling errors that Dickinson’s revision has tried to correct as best as possible, is preserved at the British Museum. It is a brief composition (37 bars) from the period of study with Albrechsberger. Dickinson compares it to Mozart’s Fugue in C Major K. 392, noting that it is “lesser in spirit and scope” but similar in style.

Origin and publication: It was probably composed around 1795 in Vienna. The first edition appeared posthumously in 1955, edited by Alan Edgar Frederic Dickinson, published in various music journals: first in February in The Musical Times, then in November as a corrected supplement to Musik im Klassen, Neue Zeitschrift für Musik, and Das Orchestre. The fugue is found on page 158 of the “Kafka” Miscellanea, alongside other sketches that Douglas Johnson dates to 1795. Johnson and Fischhof’s volume 1, pages 403 and 421, provide further details. Its first performance remains unknown. Sketches are undocumented. The transcription of the work is held at the GB-Lbl, Add. Mus. Ms 29801 (“Kafka”), folio 158r. The title is labeled “Fuga S.” The piece spans one page of musical text, in a horizontal format measuring 22.5 by 32 centimeters, with 16 lines. It was acquired between 1860 and early 1870 at Artaria in Vienna, likely purchased at auction in 1827. Later, it belonged to Johann Nepomuk Kafka in Vienna, and was acquired in 1875.

The first edition was published in 1955, February, as documented in Dickinson/Style, pages 76-79. In November 1955, a corrected version appeared as a supplement in score form titled “A Forgotten Beethoven Fugue,” in Musik im Unterricht 46 (1955), page 339, also included as a supplement in the journals Das Orchester and NZfM.

Bibliography: Cockshoot/Fuge. – Dickinson/Style. – A. E. Dickinson, “A Forgotten Beethoven Fugue,” in Musik im Unterricht 46 (1955), page 339.