titled "aria" and "punta d'organo" (the latter of which have been likened to "Le gibet" from Maurice Ravel's Gaspard de la nuit) are included in this genre. Sorabji's fugues usually follow traditional methods of development and are the most atonal and least polyrhythmic of his works. After an exposition introduces a subject and one to four countersubjects, the thematic material undergoes development. It is followed by a stretto that leads to a section featuring augmentation and a thickening of lines into chords. If a fugue has multiple themes, this pattern is repeated for each subject and material from all expositions is combined near the end. Sorabji's fugal writing has at times been treated with suspicion or criticised. The subjects can lack the frequent changes of direction present in most melodic writing, and some of the fugues are among the longest ever penned, one being the two-hour "Fuga triplex" that closes the Second Symphony for Organ. This structural layout was employed and refined in most of Sorabji's piano and organ symphonies. In some cases, a variation set takes the place of the slow movement. Starting with the Second Symphony for Piano (1954), fugues are positioned either midway through the work or right before a closing slow movement. Interludes and moto perpetuo-type sections link larger movements together and make appearances in Sorabji's later fugues, like in the Sixth Symphony for Piano (1975–76), whose "Quasi fuga" alternates fugal and non-fugal sections. Other important forms in Sorabji's output are the toccata and the autonomous variation set. The latter, along with his non-orchestral symphonies, are his most ambitious works and have been praised for the imagination exhibited in them. Sequentia cyclica super "Dies irae" ex Missa pro defunctis (1948–49), a set of 27 variations on the original Dies irae plainchant, is considered by some to be his greatest work. His four multi-movement toccatas are generally more modest in scope and take the structure of Busoni's work of the same name as their starting point. Late works In 1953, Sorabji expressed uninterest in continuing to compose when he described Sequentia cyclica (1948–49) as "the climax and crown of his work for the piano and, in all probability, the last he will write". His rate of composition slowed down in the early 1960s, and later that decade, Sorabji vowed to cease composing, which he eventually did in 1968. Hinton played a crucial role in Sorabji's return to