If fugue voices are in different keys how come they don't clash?
I was reading how a fugue plays simultaneous voices in different keys (?) I was wondering how they don't clash with eachother. Or to put it in another way, what keys can you play together such that they don't clash. For example, I can't play a C major scale with a C# major scale it would clash. So do fugues have rules as to which scales you can play simultaneously?
Edit: I may have been wrong in my assumption. Looks like all voices modulate to a new key. My bad. But it's possible to have a treble clef and a bass clef not sharing same signature / key.
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I don't think it makes sense to talk about a piece being in two keys simultaneously. A human hears a piece of music as one experience, not two independent ones that can be superimposed if the listener wants to.
That said, people have written music in two keys at the same time. They call it bitonal music or polytonality. But this is a theoretical device. Many theorists reject this idea as it isn't sensible and has no explanatory power. Why? Because it is very hard perceive it as two different things heard at the same time. Even if they are different instruments in different registers.
But yes, you can take a piece of music, for example a piano piece, and just change the key signature of the bass cleft only and play it. But it doesn't make a lot of sense to do it and it will almost certainly sound very bad.
And yes, a C# played in a piece in C major does clash. Just because it can be done and just because you can even make it sound good, that doesn't mean it doesn't clash. Many intervals are dissonant as well, and we use them. We need things that are dissonant and things that clash to make music interesting. Both saying that you are never allowed to play C# in C or saying that nothing is eve dissonant or clashes, because it can be done if you want is misguided. Music theory explains why something sounds a certain way. And playing a C# over a C chord rather than a C certainly clashes. And the theory explains why.
The subject of a fugue is first stated alone, then a second voice is added which re-states it at a different pitch (typically a 5th higher). If this 'answer' is literally transposed it's called a 'real' answer. If it's modified to remain in the tonic key it's a 'tonal' answer.
But the initial statement and the answer aren't played simultaneously! To over-simplify, it's just as if a song has a bar of C chord then one of G.
The wikpedia reference given by the OP in a comment says nothing about "playing voices in two keys simultaneously".
But the assertion that
I can't play a C major scale with a C# major scale it would clash
is not true in any case. The following example doesn't "clash," by any reasonable definition of the word. Every interval is (enharmonically, if not notationally) either a major or a minor third.
Theorists have invented "rules" for writing fugues, but their main purpose has been in marking student examinations, not composing music. One well-known rule book is the so-called "fugue d'école" which was written in the 19th century at the Conservatoire in Paris by Cherubini.
However, it's amusing that about three quarters of the fugues in Bach's "Well Tempered Clavier" would have failed the Paris Conservatoire's composition examinations. Of the eight so-called "essentials" in Cherubini's marking scheme, many of Bach's fugues only contain two or three, which is hardly a passing grade!
In fact, a fugue doesn't have to be in a "key" at all. Here is an example of one which is not. Note: the duration is about 60 minutes - somewhat longer than Bach's fugues. Don't be fooled by the slow start - things start to get more exciting after the first 10 minutes or so...
Of course some people (and perhaps the OP) might not consider that fugue by Sorabji to be "music" at all - but not everybody shares that opinion.
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