my teacher suggested me to play it before doing my G6 piano pieces.i asked her why,and she answered...to learn how to play ornaments.besides that?what else do we gain frm that?

Hi

I love the Bach Inventions, good for ornamentations but also you will learn alot musically from Bach - Especially with relation to theory. I just find them really relaxing thow too. Perhaps thats the plan.

Maybe they contain some technique other than just ornaments that may help you play your other pieces for the exam.

Hi - the Inventions are wonderful - sorry if you don't enjoy them!

Linnetbird is right about technique - they are some of the best ways of improving independence between the hands.

Maggie

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I love the Bach Inventions, good for ornamentations but also you will learn alot musically from Bach - Especially with relation to theory

relation to theory?such as?

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Hi - the Inventions are wonderful - sorry if you don't enjoy them!

I do enjoy them,and i love them since the 1st time i played it!hehe...just wondering what else i can gain frm it...

frm JS Bach inventions,i realised that i love harpsichord too!!!

I know many people who had to learn all the inventions and sinfonias before doing their grade 5. I have only done 3, but they are wonderful and can be learnt in afew hours. If you haven't played any Bach before they are a good start, they introduce counterpoint and the Baroque style, Scarlatti is also good for this type of stuff. You should look at Bach's WTC books they are brilliant, and were written for students.

Contrapunctual thinking. An important skill.

They're very important before you start learning Bach's 48 Prelude and Fugues, and I think Gr 6 is a good place to start learning ornaments. Besides, are you only learning piano to pass the exams or for the music?? I'm sure your teacher didn't make you play them just because you're doing Gr 6. After learning the 2-part inventions you probably will have to learn the sinfonias (3-part inventions) too. But I think Bach's Inventions are really fun to play, aren't they?? Almost all contrapuntal works are (for me, at least-I could play inventions for hours without realizing it!)

QUOTE (david_t @ Oct 13 2004, 05:56 PM)

Contrapunctual thinking.  An important skill.

Does that mean you are always late?

(Sorry - a bad pun!)

Contrapuntal thinking is highlighted, alongside hand independence.

I personally find them difficult, (in fact, I find all Bach difficult), but they do align your thinking, and also serve as very good warming up exercises. (Not that I am belittling the music)..

Mike

Sorry but what are Bach inventions? I don't think I have ever heard of them.....Please tell me..

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Besides, are you only learning piano to pass the exams or for the music??

For both...

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But I think Bach's Inventions are really fun to play, aren't they??

they are,i can keep playing and playing...they're interesting and exciting...

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Sorry but what are Bach inventions? I don't think I have ever heard of them.....Please tell me..

Fifteen two-part Inventions,
and Fifteen Three-part Inventions.
The 3-part are also known as Fantasias. All short-ish keyboard pieces.

BWV 772 - 801

Bach seems to have regarded them as teaching material -
"to play neatly in two-parts" and
"to treat three obbligato parts correctly and well, and at the same time, to acquire good ideas and properly to elaborate them, and most of all to learn a singing style of playing, and simultaneously to obtain a strong foretaste of composition" (from the title page of the final copy, translated into English - thanks to Karl Geiringer's book on JSB))

They were probably intended to be performed on the clavichord; these days they are played on the piano or harpsichord. In the 2 part the RH and LH are treated as two equal partners - studies in independent part-writing. Each one evolves from a single idea and contains a symmetrical series of modulations (key changes).

Maggie

QUOTE (maggiemay @ Oct 14 2004, 08:31 AM)

The 3-part are also known as Fantasias. All short-ish keyboard pieces.

Sorry, but aren't the 3-part inventions called Sinfonias instead of Fantasias???

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Sorry, but aren't the 3-part inventions called Sinfonias instead of Fantasias???

eeek yes - that was what I intended - thanks DGA.

They are known as Sinfonias. But apparently they were designated Fantasias by JSB in his first ms copy - in the second and final he changed them to Sinfonias (the two-part Inventions likewise started life as Praeambula).

Three in two days - doing well . This cold is giving me a woolly head I think.

Maggie

Poor Maggie! You've got a lot more right over the last ten months than wrong though; hope you get well soon.

QUOTE (Rupayan @ Oct 13 2004, 11:27 PM)

Sorry but what are Bach inventions? I don't think I have ever heard of them.....Please tell me..

You can download the sheet music from here:

http://www.mutopiaproject.org/cgibin/make-...achis&preview=1

if you can play bach...you can play anything in the world....

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Poor Maggie! You've got a lot more right over the last ten months than wrong though; hope you get well soon.

That's very kind - and thanks for the vote of confidence !

M

Thanks Maggiemay and spaceman...........

QUOTE (liebe_klavier @ Oct 15 2004, 04:02 AM)

if you can play bach...you can play anything in the world....

Definitely agree~! Bach shows everyone's skills. It is so important to play his inventions, sinfonias, preludes and fugues.......whatever.

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Bach seems to have regarded them as teaching material

Exactly right, he wrote them as teaching material as a prequel to the 48.

Ok, get ready for the hisses and boos - I really don't like Bach. BUT, these are brilliant pieces on many levels, ornamentation, great for theory and demonstrating different time sigs, and essential if you ever want to master the art of fugue as some of the themes are similar to some of the fugues of the 48. They are a wonderful disciplin to learn.

So I do play them, teach them and use them for sightreading (but all along side stuff I really love)