Welcome to the tonebase Piano Community!

Alexander Harvey Welcome Alex.  I am also from Australia.

I also hope to engage more with the community.  With live events, the only challenge is time difference.  

I am working on Bach’s Invention in G major and Bach’s Fugue no.1 in C major BWV 846.

Undoubtedly you will enjoy the online tutorials which I do.

Terence W Pleased to meet you, I also play that Fugue! 

Alexander Harvey Hello and Welcome, Alex!

Alexander Harvey Ok, Alex, you clearly have ESP because I'm going to ask my teacher about this passage in January when I have my next lesson. 

I don't know if this is helpful, but I'm trying to sort of "throw" my hand to land on the chord that we need to hold. Playing them with a bit more volume (even if I can't hold them for the entire half measure) kind of makes it SEEM like they are being held. 

Stay tuned to see what my teacher says in January.

Or, better yet, we can ask Sindre Skarelven because he already plays this piece!

Gail Ravin Starr Yes I would welcome such a feedback a lot! I suppose it's the second half of each measure that introduces the biggest challenge, where holding the chord with 1 and 2 leaves 4 and 5 to play the most important part of the melody. Which seems almost impossible! I am tempted to let the chord go and play D# E and C (in measure 59) with 3 and 4. Then I think the rest can be played as notated.

Gail Ravin Starr For what it's worth, I spent some time on this today and I worked out this fingering. I think the E on the 3rd beat of measure 59 is the most important to bring out and unless you have technique like Glenn Gould then I can't imagine it is possible to do that note justice while holding the 1 and 2 on the F# and A! Then I play the A at the beginning of measure 60 a second time. What do you think? 

Sindre Skarelven Gail Ravin Starr 

I think I found a fingering that makes all of this possible:

Playing the melody with 5-5 5 and sliding with a snapping motion from the black notes to the white notes. This makes holding the chord with 1 and 2 quite easy, emphasising the high white note is not too hard as a lot of power can be had by snapping down from the black note. Even holding the middle note through to the chord in the first beat of the next measure is quite achievable with this fingering.

I wonder if this is exactly what Mozart had in mind?

Alexander Harvey 

From having learned this piece during my studies (with a professor who said it requires the highest level of technical mastery), I will take the liberty to chime in with the fingering I learned back then. The top voice was 5.........., 4, 5.., 5 | 4-5, to be played all non legato. Also, she advised me to release the thumb right after attacking the fourth beat, to allow it to freely "jump" to the next 1st beat. To this day I can't find a better fingering to play that passage without pedal, but I'd still rather go to the dentist than tackle this treacherous sonata again.

Noel Nguyen Yes that's the fingering in my Henle-Verlag edition. But I really think I'm onto something with this new fingering I worked out. In addition to simply making the score playable without cheating, there's a symmetry created. E.g. Just as you slide 2-2 e.g. G#-A in measure 59 you can then create that same sound of attack by then sliding 5-5 from D#-E. Then you have 2 anchored on the A leaving 2 very strong fingers, 1 and 3, to accent the next chord. So throughout you have 2-2 then 5-5, 2-2 and 5-5 etc and strong fingers in between to sustain the held notes and bring out the polyphonic phrases.