How To Play Bach C Major Prelude 

Thanks for your appreciation! I was determined to make a tutorial on this piece displaying the chords because there is such little material on the web that teaches classical music this way. You can visit our site www.contemporaryschoolofpiano.com to get our free resources pack (Just ask us) and it comes with a lead sheet of the chords for this piece.

Love that someone from guitar is attracted by this incredible piece

try it ❤piano

I so agree.

Thank you for your kind words, I'm glad you enjoyed it. My only advice is to try not to overcomplicate your learning paths with too many methods at once! Adult learners can be good at that! This piece has a beauty to it that transcends "methods. Perhaps that's why it resonated with you.

Thanks for your kind words, glad it helped. Stay tuned for our next ones!

Many thanks :)

Many thanks 😊

My pleasure!

Many thanks!

So pleased to have discovered this channel. Thank you from San Sebastian which has a Cavaille Chord organ.

It's lovely seeing this piece in lead sheet format too. Thanks for sharing your musical journey with us, it is great reading to know what people are doing.

Thanks, Tony It's great to hear from you. I appreciate your eagerness to delve into understanding inversions. We have a video about this on the channel which you should watch that I am sure would solve some of your problems with inversions. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-O3USAjBcnkM.htmlsi=W5PIjPY2lqJuRP1s Apologies for my long response, but I've noticed a few things from your comments, it seems there might be a few areas in musical theory where you're missing the context of what theory is for. This is a very common problem. Take, for example, the piece by J.S. Bach. Its beauty and elegance stem from the use of chord voicings and inversions. Without these elements, this piece wouldn't function at all with just root chords. Inversions are built into the composition of this piece. But don't worry, it's okay to play the notes of this piece without understanding every aspect of what inversions Bach is using. In fact, I would strongly recommend that. That can come much later. I've observed that many learners, particularly those who start later in life, often mix up theoretical knowledge with what is essentially overanalysis. While it's great to be analytical, remember that music is essentially more about the action of playing it than understanding every detail of the construction of the piece. In fact, it's possible in your case, that you should wait until you can play the music, until delving too far into the theoretical aspects. You might find this approach elevates your playing much faster. I plan to create more videos addressing this common hurdle, which I like to call "death by overanalysis." By the way, there is no such thing as a minor augmented chord!! It's still just a major chord with the notes just in a different order. For now, my advice would be to focus on the physical aspect of playing. Try to familiarize your fingers with the shapes and movements required for this piece. Let muscle memory play its role. You might find it helpful to use sheet music annotated with the specific notes for each bar. This approach will allow you to experience the music more directly. Finally, remember the goal is to play and enjoy the piano, not to let unneeded analysis overshadow the joy of playing. Sometimes, the theories we impose on ourselves don't align with the composer's intentions. So, in four words: "Play now, analyze later." This mindset can be truly liberating and enhance your musical experience. Keep up the good work, and best of luck with it. This is such a great piece to enjoy and play, you've got this! If you need any more help from us you can visit our homepage, www.contemporaryschoolofpiano.com

@@contemporaryschoolofpiano I truly understand Tony , i'm retired too ! when I first learned the chords was happy it went easy into my brain , until inversions came along to mess up everything I had learned , so in my practice i love to try to play some songs, but then i realise I need to go back to the theory to understand all the basics of music (not talking about notation ) just chords so I get this into my brain ... cause otherwise what is the use of playing a song if you don't know what you are doing and why ? Yes learning music for babyboomers is difficult for the brain .... but i believe with time and practice will we make it ! And Thanks so much Tom for these Great videos sharing your expertise!

Yes. The word genius may be overused nowadays but not when referring to the music of J.S Bach!

1722 was the year it was composed!

@@contemporaryschoolofpiano yea thats 500 years if my math is correct is it not. Beautiful piece 🧩

​@@KelvinDominick-t7f301 😊

​You're from 2222? That gives me hope humankind will overcome it's current problems. Thanks mate!

🤣

This is such a good question thanks for asking me! So firstly I would say, without hesitation, play it at the tempo you feel it needs to be. Given the fact that so many people "rush" when they play the fact you feel like you want to slow it down is great. It might be you are curious about the sound of these chords and you want them to breathe more. When we talk about broader topics such as "What tempo should I play this at" or "What would Bach approve of" there are more historical points to consider, and also we get into very subjective territory to confuse it even more. What is slower and more beautiful for one listener is a funeral march for another listener. I just posted a new video of a musical arrangement I recently made, some listeners loved it, and some couldn't help but share with me, how they didn't like it at all. People's own musical experiences are real, but they can still be in a bubble! So the question you could ask yourself is why don't you like the faster tempo? Maybe it's because technically you feel like you are rushing, or maybe it's because the notes are too heavy. Seeing things from both perspectives builds a more agile musical mind. But to start with, trust your gut instincts as well, there is nothing wrong with playing this piece slowly. We don't have to ask for Bach's permission, he didn't even give us a tempo marking. So I'm making no assumptions on his part! It's the master of harmony after all, and if you want to savior that harmony, well that's a very valid way to show your appreciation for Bach's music.

Hi Gaskellr44. Thanks for your comment. Yes, piano is a difficult instrument but let me share a few very powerful tips that will really help your musical journey. You really want to start looking at chords. Chords are the foundation of all piano music you will ever play. Without the knowledge of chords, you will be playing notes "one by one" as you said in your comment. That is the approach you want to avoid like anything! If you are a beginner, I would suggest studying our videos on chords, as many of them as you can, and then returning to this tutorial and it will all make much more sense. The last thing you want to do is play this piece "note by note" as it will sound unmusical, and lose you lots of valuable time in your learning process. Think of it as speech, we want to speak in sentences, not just individual nonconnected words. Best of luck with it, and if you need any more help you can ask us more questions via www.contemporaryschoolofpiano.com we have decades of experience in coaching beginners. You might also benefit from a cheat sheet we have of this piece where the broken chords are notated into notes - this would help you more than a RU-vid video would as you see the note shapes on the page in front of you. This is a good way for a beginner to learn this piece. Just reach out to us and we can get that information over to you.

@@contemporaryschoolofpiano Thanks very much for your reply. The last few months I have been working on Fur Elise, as it's one of my fave pieces, and it took a while till I got to be able to play the first two parts pretty good now, i.e, with fairly good flow from Right hand play, and then with left hand broken chords, and I learnt that from watching a note by note video, and then worked on getting it rightish myself, but I will check out your vids on chords, as you say, it will help improve my fluidity and musicality, which I def need to work on(I take it you have them here on YT?) Yes I am starting late as a late 50s person, and tried a good few years ago, but gave up, funnily enough as I didn't think I would be able to cope with chords, but my interest came back a year or so ago, so I will persevere, especially as I can see what difference the practice has done with regard to me playing the said Beethoven piece. I think I am way off the 3rd and 4th sections of it though.

@krisking2 they aren't on the website you need to ask us for them via the contact form.

I’ll check my emails​@@contemporaryschoolofpiano

Yep!

Hi William. On this specific point, I would say both ways in no way invalidate the structural harmony of the piece. Though you are right, if I were attempting to be historical, I probably would have played it very differently (The whole piece). I would say all of this performance does not follow strict Baroque practice for many reasons. if you are familiar with this channel, we advocate improvisation even in classical music, rather than historical more literal approaches. Not that we haven't any issue with historical performance, it's just not our style of teaching and education that we advocate. Though, I would say, that ornaments in baroque music were heavily improvised in the day, and we only have the notation to really understand its context, it would have been amazing to hear what they were really doing!! I'm a bit fan however of Andras Schiff, and if I am looking for a historical understanding of ornaments, adapted for the piano, I reference his recordings, let's say rather than Glenn Gould, who takes a more counterpoint-structural-breakdown of the composition approach. It really depends on the end goal of the person performing the piece.

Haha. Yes it's 1722. But yes remembering the notes and chords is enough for me!

Yes! Annotate those notes!

Do get our resources pack, you need to visit our website www.contemporaryschoolofpiano.com

Yes, the first four chords are the same!

Sorry I don't understand what you are saying...what's "type the chords" mean? Doesn't sound like something I would say.

5:50 in the video. You talking about fingervoicing. Also at 10:31.

@@xXxGamingaddictxXx It's very useful to practice the piece in block chords it gets used to the larger shapes in the piece and trains your muscle memory to remember the chords. 5:50 I'm referring to Bach's notation and voicing, 10:31 I'm referring to strategic ways of practicing. I think you are suggesting that I'm contradicting myself, but I am not, I am instead showing different ways of practicing the piece, it's vital to practice music in different ways to gain a greater understanding.

@@contemporaryschoolofpiano Thanks, I got it now

Thankyou for bringing this to my attention. I hadn't heard of this theory before, but I found this on Wikipedia. Sorry, it's quite long. It's a known fact that Clara Schumann however did write some of Robert Schumann's pieces, the evidence surrounding J.S Bach in this case doesn't seem to be conclusive, but I'm none the wiser! Wikipedia : en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna_Magdalena_Bach Recently, it has been suggested that Anna Magdalena Bach composed several musical pieces bearing her husband's name: Professor Martin Jarvis of the School of Music at Charles Darwin University in Darwin, Australia, claims that she composed the famed six cello suites (BWV 1007-1012) and was involved with the composition of the aria from the Goldberg Variations (BWV 988) and the opening prelude of The Well-Tempered Clavier.[24] These ideas were also made into a TV documentary Written by Mrs Bach. These claims have been virtually unanimously dismissed by Bach scholars and performers. Christoph Wolff said: When I served as director of the Leipzig Bach Archive from 2001 to 2013, I and my colleagues there extensively refuted the basic premises of the thesis, on grounds of documents, manuscript sources, and musical grounds. There is not a shred of evidence, but Jarvis doesn't give up despite the fact that several years ago, at a Bach conference in Oxford, a room full of serious Bach scholars gave him an embarrassing showdown.[25] Writing in The Guardian, cellist Steven Isserlis said, "I'm afraid that his theory is pure rubbish," and continued, "How can anybody take this shoddy material seriously?" [26] Bach scholar Ruth Tatlow has written a refutation at length, centred on the TV documentary, in the journal Understanding Bach, where she calls Jarvis's claims "flawed and untenable".[27]

Thankyou, and Bach would have been thinking of it in chords as well - that's the beauty of this approach, it connects us to the composer, rather than putting them in an ivory tower!

It never gets old doesn't it!!?

Thankyou very much appreciated. Reach out to me at tom@contemporaryschoolofpiano.com, we have a little treat to say thank you for your support.

If a beginner, do not hesitate to start with THIS piece, to be discovered and rediscovered with no end.

That's a great bit advice, couldn't have said it any better myself

Hi Mick. It's such a joy to read this - music is the gift that keeps giving. Please keep us updated and write to us anytime if you have any questions.

Bobby McFerrin: It's an incredible performance, isn't it!

Yes this bar is ommited from many editions - there is a reason why, I forget why that is! It's a nice extra dark corner in the piece.

It seems to form a nice transition from the F# to the G#. I wonder if it was added later.@@contemporaryschoolofpiano

It is the schenke measure not written by bach. Schenke dared to correct Bach, poor fool. Unfortunately when Gounod composed ave maria used the schenke measure. So if you play Bach prelude you must NOT play this measure. If you are playing Ave Maria then you have to use it

That's a very good question. The main answer is because there are so many finger patterns you can use in this piece. It's unlikely Bach would have written any down himself, he would have kept that admin in hands of person playing the piece. Is there any fingering you are unsure about?

@@contemporaryschoolofpiano Hi and thanks for your reply, most kind. I won't go over every single difference i've noted as that'd be exhausting and your original reply would most likely answer most. Some obvious i've noticed on different sheets; Bars 1 to 4.....some start with RH 135 and stay there while others start on 124, hit a 135, then return to 124. Some LH start 31, others 21. On the 6th bar, some have LH 32 while others 21 and on RH 125 and still others 235. Some other sheets LH will continue alternating 21 with 31 up to the 9th bar where some have a LH 41 fingering while others keep the 31. Bar 12 introduces the 1st flatted note and that LH sequence some are played with 21 while others have 32. RH in the same bar is playing 124 while others 125. Other sheets have some LH spots going from 41 to 31 in the same bar! You can see then my frustration though i don't mind playing different fingerings, i'm trying to remain consistent as i had picked up some bad habits in my previous studies and am trying to make corrections to help my playing in the future. Thanks so much for your help.

@tropicvibe yes and this piece is built on three note triads - so with 5 fingers in the right hand there are always going to be ways in which to use your fingering. Ultimately a triad can played many ways - 1 3 5, 1 2 4, 1 2 5 etc. So the real question you've stumbled on here is even more fundamental - how do I choose my fingering when playing chords?

@@contemporaryschoolofpiano Thanks again for your help, as i mentioned before my main concern with fingerings is because yet another published version of this very same piece with Czerny's fingerings are quite different from yours in several spots though i've also seen your fingerings elsewhere.

Yes, we can't cover all of the difficulties of music in a 20-minute tutorial,. But that is why chords are useful because they help you understand the bullet points of the piece, hence making the music more digestible and easier to memorize. You've got this! Just put some time into some strategic practice. Tip. Start on the 2nd page sometimes, other times start halfway through the first page. Try and avoid just battling through the piece. Learn in small sections. Best of luck!

You might find it helpful to write the chord name and its inversion above the applicable notes in the measure. It is easier to conceive of a block of notes working together as a chord and then have the hand learn that shape. Edit: this was a response to “relicofgold”.

This is a great question. 4 part playing is a difficult skill, the fact you are playing in that style is a huge benefit and credit to your musicianship congratulations. Tenor parts are precious, they provide the counterpoint to the Soprano, and as you pointed out they are not always easy to voice, because of the intervals in the left hand (and right hand for that matter) - generally it's best to share them through both hands, if your hands are smaller, go for the hand with the smallest interval or if you have larger hands and you can comfortably reach a tenth interval, you can continue a voice passage with the same hand to allow for less voice exchange between both hands, generally it's about planning the arrangement that best suits your hands. Keep up the good work, you'll soon be playing Bach fugues!