Prélude, choral et fugue, FWV 21, FWV 21; CFF 24

César Franck (1,822–1,890)

First published: 1885
Key: B minor
Style: Romantic
Level: Fellowship and Concert
Roughly: ABRSM FRSM · Trinity FTCL · Henle 9
Lesson: C.5 Make cyclic returns audible without announcing them
Musicianship: C.5 A transformed answer
Focus: Carry the themes and balance the voices across the three connected sections

What its lesson teaches

C.5 Make cyclic returns audible without announcing them

Prepare Franck’s complete Prélude, choral et fugue, FWV 21. Compare distinctive material across the three parts using interval, rhythm and harmonic evidence before deciding how the returns should sound. Practise a reduction of the related passages together, then restore their different registers and textures. Let the long-range relationship guide balance and pacing without treating every resemblance as a quotation or every local intensity as the work’s main climax.

Ideas: Large forms and cycles
Thematic transformation
Independent voices
Theory cards: Transformed returns
Harmonic signatures
Technique: Chromatic minor thirds from B, hands together, 2 octaves
B melodic minor scale, hands together, 2 octaves

Edition and licence

Score: Checked bar by bar against Collection Litolff no. 1578 (Enoch & Cie, Paris), Sibley Music Library hdl 1802/18610, 2026-10-28: every bar compared; 110 bars corrected.

Adapted by Musalea: corrected from the print, converted to MusicXML and prepared for interactive practice.

Practice tempos: chosen by Musalea from the printed tempo words, which are kept unchanged; the print gives no metronome marks. Each section has its own tempo; the small rubato and ritardando steps are practice aids, not a model for performance.

https://hdl.handle.net/1802/18610

https://www.henle.de/media/13/00/95/1690886031/0494-1690886031-sync.pdf

Collection Litolff no.1578; Paris: Enoch & Cie, undated later issue of the original 1885 German engraving, not the later French re-engraving numbered E.&C.1113

Encoding source: https://hdl.handle.net/1802/18610 · public domain

Prélude, choral et fugue, FWV 21

Edition: Collection Litolff no.1578; Paris: Enoch & Cie, undated later issue of the original 1885 German engraving, not the later French re-engraving numbered E.&C.1113

Published: 1885

Source: https://hdl.handle.net/1802/18610

Public-domain source edition(s).

Checked bar by bar against Collection Litolff no. 1578 (Enoch & Cie, Paris), Sibley Music Library hdl 1802/18610, 2026-10-28: every bar compared; 110 bars corrected.

Encoding source: https://hdl.handle.net/1802/18610

The other lesson pieces of Fellowship and Concert

Goldberg Variations, BWV 988 — complete cycle, Johann Sebastian Bach
Piano Sonata No. 32 in C minor, Op. 111: I. Maestoso – Allegro con brio ed appassionato, Ludwig van Beethoven
Piano Sonata No. 2 in B-flat minor, Op. 35 — complete, Frédéric Chopin
Étude in A minor “Winter Wind”, Op. 25 No. 11, Frédéric Chopin
Piano Sonata No. 3 in B minor, Op. 58 — complete, Frédéric Chopin
Étude in C minor, Op. 25 No. 12, Frédéric Chopin
24 Preludes, Op. 28 — complete cycle, Frédéric Chopin
Toccata in C major, Op. 92, Carl Czerny
Gaspard de la nuit, M. 55: III. Scarbo, Maurice Ravel
Piano Concerto No. 1 in E minor, Op. 11 — complete, Frédéric Chopin

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