Date: Thu, 5 Nov 2009 10:01:29 -0500

From: Kathie Hollandsworth 

To: Cyberpluckers 

Subject: Re: [CP] Tunes "lying" well on the 'harp (was Diatonic

'harps)


As usual, Siegfried's post is very astute :-))  The Minuet in G from the

Little Anna Magdalena Bach Notebook is widely taught to young students and

known so well that it is the one people automatically think of when they

hear the title "Minuet in G".  Of course, a minuet is a dance, like a waltz

or many other dance forms, and the composers of that era wrote tons of

minuets, and lots of them were in G. They didn't indicate the key in the

title as a rule.  I've been meaning to pull the music out and analyze the

chords too, to see how I would compare with Bob's version.  If I recall

correctly, there are not many, if any, full chords written in, but only one

treble note and one bass note sounding, and you have to imply the

harmonization from those, and from your ear.


In anthologies of easier piano pieces, the 2 from the "Anna" notebook that

are usually included are the Minuet in G and its companion in G minor, which

is a beautiful tune that would also be delightful arranged for autoharp,

even if it had to be transposed to another minor key !


Kathie


On Thu, Nov 5, 2009 at 5:17 AM, Siegfried Knoepfler wrote:


       Following an initiative by Ron Bean, I began working again on the

well known Minuet in G by J.S.Bach, for which Bob Lewis published an

arrangement for diatonic (two-key) autoharp a few weeks ago. I learned this

piece to play on my 'harp around 1983 from sheet music I got from a

colleague who was playing alto recorder: The notation contained therefore

only the melody line and it was printed in the key of Bb. Since playing it

in Bb didn't sound well on the OS 21 chords 'harp I used in those days, I

simply moved my left hand fingers down two positions and played it in the

key of C for all the years. I felt that in this key the tune was optimally

positioned within the range of the standard OS string schedule.

       My old arrangement differs considerably from Bob's. In order to find

reasons for one or the other I consulted the library of my old university

and looked up the original in the complete Bach works edition, where I found

it in "Klavierbüchlein für Anna Magdalena Bach" (1725). In both of the

Klavierbüchlein (literally: little piano book), the 1722 and the 1725 one,

there are altogether 10 minuets (my count), all simply called "Menuet"

without a key reference in the name; at least 3 of them are written in the

key of G, among them the one in question, Menuet, BWV Anh. 114. (So I wonder

why just this one is usually referred to as Bach's Minuet in G.)


-- 

John and Kathie Hollandsworth

700 Tower Rd.

Christiansburg, VA  24073

540-382-6550

www.blueridgeautoharps.com

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