Bach Invention in B-flat Major Played by Michael Brazile
An Original Video of an Amateur Pianist
When I play this piece, one of the most well-known and oft-played from the set of 15 Two-Part Inventions, I like to take the attitude, “OK, I have ‘sameness’ as the defining feature of the piece…so how do I take this same theme that’s repeated unrelentingly throughout the piece—which is indeed the basis of the piece—and make it sound NOT the same?” Or, to think of it another way, “How do I make the everyday and the mundane interesting and full of nuance; how do I make it full of light and shadow, differentness and intrigue?”
To approach the piece with this concept, I choose a relatively slow tempo and allow the music plenty of places to pause and breathe, so that in some moments, the 32nd-note theme’s appearance almost comes as a surprise.
Just as in the Cello Suites and the Sonatas and Partitas for solo violin, in the Two-Part Inventions, Bach was trying to achieve a musical maximum with a self-imposed minimum of resources. For a keyboard without pedals, two lines are as barebones as it can get to create contrapuntal music. As such, I want to play these Inventions—and really all of Bach’s music—in a probing and curious way; in a way that plays the explorative impulse that propelled Bach to write this music.
![]() look inside |
Two-Part Inventions Composed by Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750). Edited by Willard A. Palmer. Masterworks; Piano Collection. Alfred Masterwork Editions. Baroque. Collection. With standard notation, fingerings, introductory text and instructional text (does not include words to the songs). 64 pages. Published by Alfred Music (AP.604). |
You are so correct, I believe. My rather humorless teacher (unfortunately) did have these worthy words to put the inventions and sinfonias in a musical light.
“Think of ladies having tea and conversation. One lady will say this and the idea is picked up by the other two… a casual talk on a Sunday afternoon”
Those are worthy words!