Prelude in C Minor: Artistry

Hello and welcome back! I'm Joseph Hoffman,

and in this lesson we're going to learn about how to play "Prelude in C Minor BWV 999" by J.S. Bach with maximum artistry.

Let's get started by checking out the score.

Remember, that J.S. Bach lived in the Baroque Era,

and these dates help remind us of that. In the Baroque Era there's certain stylistic things we want to remember. For example,

it's very rare to use the damper pedal when playing Baroque music.

For this piece, don't even think about touching the damper pedal. You won't need it,

and it won't make it sound appropriate for the Baroque style that Bach was writing in.

Also remember that in the Baroque Era, composers very rarely put dynamic markings in their music,

and so these dynamic markings that you see in Baroque pieces,

are there not from Bach, but from the editor, in this case me.

I added these dynamics just to give you some ideas, but don't treat them

sacred or religious, it's just an idea, and if you have another idea for dynamics that you think makes the music speak to you,

go for it.

These are ideas I'd like you to try, but remember those are from me not from Bach.

Also, Baroque composers very rarely put phrase marks or things like little crescendos and decrescendos, but

I encourage you to add your own phrases and dynamics

along the way even if it's not shown in the music by me you know it's very tedious

as an editor to go through and show every little place you might want to do a little crescendo or decrescendo,

but as a performer you should be doing those things. We can turn this little group of 16th notes

into a little interesting phrase with some shape to it.

We don't want to play all seven of these 16th notes the same that would get boring.

So give it a shape.

See, it can get a little louder in the middle, then a little softer at the end.

That sounds much more interesting than:

With every note the same gets so boring.

So even if the music doesn't say to do it, add shape to your music.

It should always be coming or going, rising or falling.

Music is communication, so give it an interesting shape as you play.

One way to help give it shape is to think about which hand has the most important part at the moment.

Like here in beats 1 and 2, the left hand plays this C, and then rests.

That doesn't seem that interesting to me, so I'm going to bring the right hand out a little bit more here,

but then let's look at beat 3. Now the right hand just goes C, C, with a couple of rests.

That now seems very boring to me, and this seems a little more interesting down here. So I might kind of bring out

these notes more

in that part of the measure and bring these notes out more in the first part of the measure. So right hand, left hand,

right hand, left hand, and see in this part I'm going to make those right hand notes really soft so my left hand

can get the spotlight right there.

See that?

If I play those C's loudly, that sounds kind of ugly to me. Listen to the ugly way.

See, that just sounds like someone being annoying tapping on your shoulder.

Okay, we want those C's to be gentle so the left hand can have the spotlight there.

Bring out the right hand, then soft right hand and stronger left hand.

Takes a lot of practice, so maybe slow motion at first. Right hand, left hand, right hand, left hand's turn.

When the left hand has the turn, get the right hand out of the way. Super soft, pianississimo in the right hand.

When you play these notes, think of them almost like parentheses, like barely important now at all.

Another place I want to look at is down here

starting in measure seven the left hand starts to do something that I find pretty interesting. We've been on this C a lot. Look,

in measure one we play a C on beat 1. A C, a C, a C, a C.

We call this a pedal tone, where we have just one bass note that just sustains for many measures. Another C, and now finally Bach gives us a B-flat. See, we've got this C, then B-flat, then A-flat.

G, then bum, bum, F-sharp.

Now let's just look at the notes I've circled. And look for the pattern with me.

Actually, let's circle this C as well because this is kind of where the pattern begins. We start on the C, B-flat,

A-flat, G, F. What do you notice? Bach has just created this stepping down pattern,

but spread out over five different measures with these other notes in between.

But, if you as a performer notice that pattern, ...