chrisliang.com

Andante (BWV1003) by JS Bach
Grade 4 Late Intermediate
Time 2:22

This serene and beautiful piece is taken from Sonata ii of Bach’s six sonatas and partitas for unaccompanied violin. It fits on the guitar fingerboard so well that it is unnecessary to alter a single note of the original for this transcription. Only the tempo and fingerings for guitar have been added. The violin of Bach’s day had a somewhat flatter bridge and was played with a slightly more curved bow than the modern violin. These two factors made it easier for violinists of the time to play chords on two, three or four strings of the instrument. This accounts for the multi-voiced texture and full-sounding chords of this piece.

Technique
Play AAB. Repeat Part A (twice) conclude with part B (twice)
Bar[9]-[27]- 32nd Note. Slurs or cross-string fingering 29 total bars. 8th notes in all measures except Bar[9] and [25]-[26]. Bar[9] and [27] 32nd note flourishes are either performed with slurs (hammer-ons and pull-offs) or cross string-fingerings. A cross-string fingering is one in which stepwise notes are fingered on different strings rather than along a single string. This is the easiest way to play fast scales.
Bar[7] and [26] I have left the optional notes in brackets (3) on the 1st E string. I opted for the g note on the open g string (4th string). I have included the original fingering. If you can reach the bass G note, go for it.

Excerpt from bach bwv 1003 andante

Tips
The most noticeable aspect of this work is the bass line in constant eighth notes, which is present for all but four measures. To avoid sounding monotonous, try to play the bass line in as musical and expressive as possible. To gain as much separation as possible between the melody and the bassline, be sure to play all the bass notes with the thumb

Download Tab | Download Midi

Further Reading
I learnt Bwv1003 Andante from this book: Bach for Guitar by Howard Wallach. 14 pieces from Easy to Intermediate introducing a brief song introduction and tab. This book comes with plenty of drawings and a full explanation of signs and symbols used in the book. 47 pages in paperpack, Alfred Publishing.

This entry was posted on Thursday, January 14th, 2010 at 2:46 pm and is filed under 1.SONGS, 4.GRADES, Grade 4, Johann S Bach. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.