Indepth look at Bach's Prelude and Fugue in D minor (Book 1)
Bach's Well Tempered Clavier is a seminal work of the musical literature. Today we take a look at the Prelude and Fugue in D minor (Book 1) with advice on the musical and technical challenges within!
Find the start time in your time zone by clicking the photo or following this event link:
https://app.tonebase.co/piano/live/player/bach-prelude-fugue-d-minor-book-1-live
We are going to be using this thread to gather suggestions and questions!
- What questions do you have on this topic?
- Any particular area you would like me to focus on?
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Hi Dominic ! I love that you have chosen this piece for the live session. I find this piece so much fun to play, actually one of the most fun pieces to play in my repertoire. It's because I love those transitions Bach does with the running triplets. (I have played way too few Bach pieces...)
I have a question about your choices for pedaling and touch (legato/staccato/portato)
How you will measure out the trills in the fugue?
Any tips on practicing this before a concert? Rhythm-practices, perhaps?
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Sindre Skarelven Great questions! Will address tomorrow :)
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Dominic Cheli Awesome! :)
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Bonjour Dominic Cheli , I don't find the partition for this piece of music, can you please give me the link under my reply ? Thank You!
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Dominic Cheli Thank You Dominic!
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Thank you for a wonderful lesson today! I love hearing you play Bach! Listening to you explain the definitions and various versions is quite fascinating!
“Analyze Fugue before you play, or at least before you perform it.” You gave us a lot of tools and information to do just that!
Yes, the more melodic way of playing the Prelude is soulful.
Bach was also a violinist!
Relevance for the “bow strokes” as they’re played on piano became clear because of your explanations.
Interesting to highlight the dangers of “compressing” the phrases in the leaps.
In other words, because it is relatively easy to make the leap on piano (as opposed to voice or violin), we may be tempted to “compress it”, but it makes it more soulful to take some time with the leap…to make it more dramatic.
* Importance of the right impression, affectation. Even more than the right note. Yes, hitting right notes is desired, yet prioritizing what’s important is paramount.
One is so clearly reminded of this fact: Bach! Genius!
* “Paying attention to harmony.” * “Focus on as many musical decisions as possible.” Picardy 3rd - Quite intriguing!
In Bach’s approach - important to see a Glimmer of God, of Hope!
It is interesting to see how often the subject appears (or portions of the subject) in the areas you highlighted in yellow.
Great idea to put the reference “sheet”/definitions on screen as you teach.
Yes, Bach’s music can be played at any tempo! His brilliance shines in every one.
Open 5ths - commentary is riveting and obvious since you explained it.
Thank you!
