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Bach's two-part inventions

Bach's two-part inventions, easiest first: No. 1 in C at level 3, most of the rest at level 4, and No. 9 in F minor at level 5. Each is a page or two for two equal voices, the usual step after the Little Preludes and before the three-part sinfonias and the suites. Each has easier versions made from the score itself (the right-hand melody alone, then with left-hand roots), so you can start a step down and play it as written later.

Pieces
13
Levels
3 to 5
Key signatures
4 flats to 4 sharps
Length
20 to 124 bars

Reading an invention

Bach wrote the fifteen two-part inventions in 1723 for his pupils, to teach them to play two voices cleanly and, in the words of his title page, to arrive at a singing style. Each takes a short motif and passes it between the hands: one hand states it, the other answers with it a few beats later, and the whole piece is built from that motif moved to other pitches, turned upside down and set against itself.

Read the first bar until you know the motif by sight; after that, much of the page is the same shape in the other hand or at another pitch. Neither hand is the accompaniment, so practise each alone first (a piece's ladder here starts that way), then together slowly. No. 1 in C is the usual first; No. 8 in F and No. 13 in A minor are often next.

Level 3

Both hands busy, the hand moves around, a sharp or flat or two.

Level 4

Real independence between the hands and more accidentals.

Level 5

The edge of early intermediate: dense textures, fast passages and far keys.

Open a piece to print any of its versions free, or to play it at your MIDI keyboard with every note marked. New to reading? The level 2 sight-reading exercises are a good warm-up.