Easy Bach Piano Pieces: 14 Works Ranked from Easiest to Intermediate

On the 0–10 piano difficulty scale, which groups repertoire into Beginner (0–3), Intermediate (4–6) and Advanced (7–10), Bach's keyboard works in the Virtu catalog run from difficulty 2 to difficulty 9. Unlike our easy Chopin pieces guide, which starts at difficulty 4, Bach wrote short dances and teaching pieces, some in a notebook for his son Wilhelm Friedemann, that late beginners can play in their original form. Mapped broadly to years of study and the Henle 1–9 scale, the pieces fall into four bands:

• Difficulty 2–3 (late beginner, roughly 1 to 2 years of lessons, roughly Henle 1–2): moving two single-note lines in contrary and parallel motion in 3/4, keeping a broken-chord pattern even, and placing simple mordents on the beat. Covers the first five pieces below plus the four Anna Magdalena notebook pieces.
• Difficulty 4–5 (early intermediate, roughly 2 to 4 years of lessons, roughly Henle 3–4): holding tied suspensions between two voices in one hand, passing eighth- and sixteenth-note patterns between the hands, and playing your first Little Preludes, suite dances and two-part Inventions. Covers seven pieces on this list.
• Difficulty 6 (intermediate, roughly 4 to 5 years of lessons, roughly Henle 5): playing fast sixteenth notes in both hands at once across wide leaps, or separating three fugal voices cleanly between two hands. Covers Inventions Nos. 8, 13 and 4, and the three-voice C minor fugue from Book I of The Well-Tempered Clavier (BWV 847).
• Difficulty 7–9 (early advanced to advanced, roughly 5+ years of lessons, roughly Henle 6–8): concert preludes, partitas and multi-section toccatas requiring sustained sixteenth-note stamina and multi-voice contrapuntal control.

At difficulties 2 to 4 the pieces run from the fewest bars to the most; notice the length spread at difficulty 3, where the Applicatio is just 8 bars (53 seconds) while the 32-bar Goldberg Aria lasts about 5:30 with its repeats. Before choosing a piece, open the score to the hardest bars listed below and test them at half speed with hands-separate practice.

The Johann Sebastian Bach catalog on Virtu holds 77 keyboard scores across the 0–10 scale: 2 at difficulty 2, 5 at difficulty 3, 15 at difficulty 4, 26 at difficulty 5, 15 at difficulty 6, 11 at difficulty 7, 2 at difficulty 8, and 1 at difficulty 9. From the 63 scores at difficulty 2–6, this guide selects fourteen pieces covering suite dances, little preludes, a Well-Tempered Clavier prelude, the Goldberg Aria and the Inventions: three suite dances (two minuets from BWV 822 and the Gavotte from French Suite No. 5), five pieces from Wilhelm Friedemann's notebook and the Little Preludes (BWV 994, 939, 941, 926 and 942), the Prelude in C minor (BWV 999), the opening prelude of The Well-Tempered Clavier Book I (BWV 846), the Goldberg Variations Aria (BWV 988), and three two-part Inventions (Nos. 1, 8 and 13). The other seven two-part Inventions appear below in a ten-piece Invention difficulty order, followed by the four Anna Magdalena Bach notebook pieces. Each card gives the difficulty, what the piece teaches and "The hard bit", pointing to the busiest bars at tempo.

Minuet I (Suite in G minor, BWV 822, V, difficulty 2, 16 bars, 49 seconds) is a crisp, stately G minor dance with single notes in each hand from start to finish, making it a clear first step toward two independent lines. It is the fifth movement of the Suite in G minor, BWV 822, which survives in a single Leipzig manuscript. In 3/4 time, the first eight-bar strain repeats before bars 9–16 move to B-flat major, and at bar 16 Da Capo (from the head) sends you back to the opening to finish at the end of the first strain in bar 8.

The hardest spots are the tied left-hand note across bars 2–3 and the shared eighth-note runs in bars 7 and 15. The left hand ties a G across the barline from bar 2 into beat 1 of bar 3 before four eighth notes that turn and step down, while bars 7 and 15 ask both hands to step down together in four eighth notes across beats 2 and 3. Hold the tied G through beat 1 of bar 3 before the eighth notes, and use two-hands coordination practice to line up the hands in bars 7 and 15.

The Prelude in C major, BWV 846 (difficulty 2, 35 bars, about 2 minutes), unfolds a calm, rippling wave of broken chords that changes hand shape only once per bar, so a late beginner can focus entirely on even tone. Written in Bach's 1722 autograph to open Book I of The Well-Tempered Clavier, it repeats one five-note figure twice per bar through bar 32 over an eight-bar low G pedal (bars 24–31) to the final C major chord; Gounod later wrote his Ave Maria above it.

The hardest bars are bars 33–34, where the repeating pattern breaks into free sixteenth-note runs over held bass notes. Over a tied bass octave in bar 33, the right hand plays seven sixteenth notes up and back, and the left hand carries the line down with seven more; in bar 34, the right hand sweeps through fourteen sixteenth notes up to high F and back down. Learn bars 1–32 as five-note hand shapes with blocked-chord practice, then drill bars 33–34 slowly.

Applicatio, BWV 994 (difficulty 3, 8 bars, 53 seconds), is the shortest piece in this guide and the only score here that prints fingering, Bach's own. It is the first piece in the keyboard notebook he began in 1720 for his son Wilhelm Friedemann. In eight bars of 4/4 time, the right hand climbs an eighth-note C major scale with mordents in bars 1–2, and the left hand answers with the scale in bar 3 under right-hand thirds.

The trickiest spots are bar 4 and the cadences in bars 6 and 8, where ornaments meet multi-voice writing in a single hand. In bar 4, the right hand divides into several voices as its lowest line steps up to a G with a mordent; in bars 6 and 8, one hand plays an inverted mordent on a dotted quarter note while a tied inner voice resolves in sixteenth notes with another inverted mordent. Follow trills and ornaments practice by learning bars 4, 6 and 8 without the mordents first so the voices and ties stay steady.

Minuet III (Suite in G minor, BWV 822, VII, difficulty 3, 25 bars, about 1 minute) brings a warm G major contrast to the G minor suite preserved in the Leipzig manuscript, adding a held inner thumb note in the left hand that makes the texture fuller than in Minuet I. Written in 3/4 across two repeated halves of eight and sixteen bars (25 bars in all), it asks the left hand in bar 2 to hold a tied G (most players use the thumb) while playing quarter notes underneath, before stepping down in four eighth notes in bar 3.

The hardest stretch is bars 13–17, where the hands trade eighth-note runs and leap to wider registers. In bar 13, the hands pass eighth notes back and forth over a held low A, before the right hand leaps into the high register for descending eighth-note runs in bars 14–15 and the left hand jumps an octave in bar 17. Practise the bar 13 handoff and the right-hand leaps in bars 14–15 slowly with hands-separate practice before putting the hands together.

Aria with Diverse Variations (Goldberg Variations: Aria), BWV 988 (difficulty 3, 32 bars, about 5:30), is a serene, richly ornamented melody in 3/4 time that lets a late beginner play the Aria that opens the Goldberg Variations. Printed in Nuremberg for a two-manual harpsichord to open the Goldberg Variations (our edition holds the Aria alone), its two repeated sixteen-bar halves unfold over a slow bass stepping down from G in bars 1–4, the bass line that underlies the thirty variations.

Although the slow pulse keeps it at difficulty 3, the subdivision thickens in bars 7, 15–16 and 28–30. Bar 7 runs four slurred thirty-second-to-dotted-sixteenth figures through beats 1 and 2, and the left hand answers with six sixteenths from the middle of beat 2, while bars 28–30 ask the right hand to hold an inner voice as its upper voice spins twelve continuous sixteenth notes per bar over six left-hand eighths. Use finger independence practice on the two right-hand lines in bars 28–30, playing the right hand alone before adding the bass.

The Prelude in C major, BWV 939 (difficulty 4, 16 bars, 29 seconds), is a bright, half-minute study that passes broken chords between the hands and makes a brisk step up from difficulty 3. The first of the Five Little Preludes, BWV 939–943, it opens in 4/4 with right-hand eighth-note broken chords over a low C octave tied through bars 1–3, then hands the running eighths to the left hand in bars 4–5 under right-hand chords.

Two spots make it difficulty 4: the left-hand mordent leaps in bars 9–11 and the right-hand sixteenth-note run in bar 14. Through bars 9–11, under right-hand eighth-note arpeggios, the left hand plays G with a mordent on beats 1 and 3 and leaps down an octave on beats 2 and 4 six times, while bar 14 sends the right hand through sixteen continuous sixteenth notes down and back up over a held bass note. Steady the bar 14 scale against the beat with metronome timing practice.

The Prelude in E minor, BWV 941 (difficulty 4, 22 bars, 32 seconds), is a compact, expressive three-voice prelude in 3/4 time that teaches you to lean into tied suspensions and resolve them cleanly. After right-hand eighth-note broken chords over a two-voice bass in bars 1–2, bars 11–18 trade eighth-note arpeggios between the hands bar by bar before closing on an E major chord in bar 22.

The core challenge is the chain of tied suspensions in the right hand across bars 4–8 (and 19–20). Above six steady left-hand eighth notes per bar, the right hand holds a tied upper note across each barline, starting with E tied from bar 3 into bar 4, and resolves it downward while its lower fingers play an inner voice underneath. Use finger independence practice on bars 4–8, playing the two right-hand voices alone first until every tied note stays down for its full value.

Invention No. 1 in C major, BWV 772 (difficulty 4, 22 bars, about 1:20), is a lively two-voice dialogue where both hands share the same melody as equals, and as the first of the set it is a natural first piece for playing two equal parts. It opens the fifteen two-part Inventions Bach wrote out fair in 1723 as a lesson in playing two parts cleanly and in composing. In bar 1, the right hand states a seven-note sixteenth-note subject and the left hand answers an octave lower; in bars 3–4 the subject is turned upside down, and later the piece visits G major and A minor before returning to C major.

The hardest bars are the sequential runs in bars 3–4 (and 11–12) and the simultaneous sixteenth notes in bars 13–14. Across beats 3–4 of bar 13 and beats 1–2 of bar 14 (and beat 3 of bar 21), both hands play continuous sixteenth-note figures at once in contrary and parallel motion instead of taking turns. Combine hands-separate practice and two-hands coordination practice on bars 13–14, aligning the first sixteenth note of each beat slowly before playing up to tempo.

The Gavotte (Suite in G major, BWV 816, IV, difficulty 4, 26 bars, about 1 minute) from French Suite No. 5 in G major is a buoyant, courtly dance that teaches crisp chord voicing and upbeat phrasing in about a minute. Written in cut time (2/2) across two repeated halves, each phrase launches on the half bar (bar 0 opens with two quarter-note beats over a left-hand G octave jump), setting a bright tune in chords and eighth notes over steady quarters and eighths in the bass.

The busiest stretch is bars 18–23 in the second half, especially bars 19–20. From bar 18 through bar 23, the left hand runs through six unbroken bars of eighth-note scales while the right hand joins it in eighth notes in bars 19–20 and voices two-part chords above it in bars 21–23. Practise the left-hand eighth-note line of bars 18–23 alone first until your thumb crossings are smooth, then add the right hand at half tempo.

The Prelude in C minor, BWV 999 (difficulty 4, 43 bars, about 1:50), spins a dramatic, restless stream of C minor broken chords that sounds far more turbulent than its one-bar pattern is to learn. It survives in an eighteenth-century copy headed "Prélude in C mol. pour la Lute" (Prelude in C minor for the lute) and is played today on keyboard, lute and guitar. From bar 1 to bar 41 in 3/4 time, each bar pairs a first-beat bass quarter and a seven-note right-hand sixteenth arpeggio with two third-beat left-hand eighths that interlock with off-beat right-hand sixteenths, closing in bar 43 on a G major chord, the dominant of C minor.

The hardest stretch is bars 17–32 (especially bars 20–25) over a low D pedal and bar 42 where the pattern breaks. From bar 17 to bar 32 (except bar 23), the left hand strikes low D on beat 1 and leaps up on beat 3 to middle-register eighth notes under shifting chromatic broken chords, before bar 42 sends eleven right-hand sixteenths into the final chord. Use blocked-chord practice on bars 17–32 to map each bar's hand shape before playing the arpeggios as written.

The Prelude in D minor, BWV 926 (difficulty 5, 48 bars, 59 seconds), is an energetic, driving one-minute piece in 3/4 time from the 1720 keyboard notebook Bach began for Wilhelm Friedemann. Powered by six eighth notes per bar, it unfolds broken chords over a D in the bass in bars 1–6 as the left hand alternates between a mordented D and the octave below, before both hands climb in eighth notes in bars 7–8.

What lifts it to difficulty 5 is the sixteenth-note burst in bars 39–43. In bar 39, five right-hand sixteenths hand the line to seven left-hand sixteenths, and the run continues in the left hand in bar 40 before passing back to the right hand through bar 42. Bar 43 lands on a three-note chord over left-hand eighths, with four left-hand sixteenths on beat 3, and resolves with an inverted mordent in bar 44 before the D major close in bar 48. Drill bars 39–42 in two-bar units with difficult-passage practice.

The Prelude in A minor, BWV 942 (difficulty 5, 17 bars, 39 seconds), is a compact, swirling prelude in 9/8 time that teaches a rolling three-beat compound pulse in under forty seconds. Its right hand flows in eighth notes in bar 1 over single bass notes, slips three quick sixteenths after a dotted eighth in bar 2 (a figure the left hand takes over in bars 4–5), and joins the left hand in continuous eighth notes in bars 3 and 6.

The hardest bars are bars 10–11 and 15–17. In bar 10, the right hand climbs an eighteen-note sixteenth-note scale up to high C before the left hand answers in bar 11 with a five-note turn figure on all three beats, and in bars 15–17 the hands trade descending sixteenth runs as the upper line drops into the lower staff before the closing fermata (held pause). Play bar 10's scale in groups of six notes, one group per dotted-quarter beat, before joining them.

Invention No. 8 in F major, BWV 779 (difficulty 6, 34 bars, 54 seconds), is a sparkling, sunlit chase in 3/4 time, under a minute long, for when you reach difficulty 6. Written out fair in 1723 among the fifteen two-part Inventions, its right hand climbs an F major chord in eighth notes in bar 1 and runs down in ten sixteenth notes in bar 2 while the left hand follows one bar later at the lower octave, moving to C major and through minor keys before returning to F major.

It reaches difficulty 6 because both hands play fast sixteenths together in bars 5–6 (and 27–28) and bar 9 (and 31), and leap across wide intervals in bars 19–23. In bars 5–6 and 27–28, both hands play twelve oscillating sixteenths per bar in parallel sixths, and in bars 9 and 31 both hands run down in parallel sixteenth scales; bars 19–20 in the left hand and 21–23 in the right hand keep leaping back and forth across sixths, sevenths and octaves. Use two-hands coordination practice on bars 5–6.

Invention No. 13 in A minor, BWV 784 (difficulty 6, 25 bars, about 1 minute), is a driving, motoric A minor study propelled by broken-chord sixteenth-note leaps that trade rapidly between the hands. The thirteenth of the 1723 two-part Inventions, it opens in 4/4 with the right hand breaking A minor and E major chords in leaping sixteenths on beats 1–2 of bar 1 while the left hand answers in eighths, swapping roles on beats 3–4 before bars 3–5 spin tied eighth notes and sixteenth arpeggios toward C major.

The hardest passage is the left-hand run in bar 12 and the climax across bars 19–21. After the left hand plays fourteen leaping sixteenths in bar 12, bar 19 puts sixteen leaping sixteenth-note broken chords in both hands together across all four beats, followed in bars 20–21 by two bars of wide-leaping right-hand sixteenths over left-hand eighths. Apply difficult-passage practice to bar 19, blocking each beat as a chord in each hand before playing the notes broken.

Here are all ten of the 1723 two-part Inventions in the Virtu catalog ranked easiest first:

• Invention No. 1 in C major, BWV 772 (difficulty 4, 22 bars): in 4/4, a seven-note sixteenth subject passes between the hands, turns upside down, and visits G major and A minor before returning to C.
• Invention No. 7 in E minor, BWV 778 (difficulty 4, 23 bars): in 4/4, a mordented eighth- and sixteenth-note subject sounds over leaping octaves, with a long trill on high D and long tied notes.
• Invention No. 3 in D major, BWV 774 (difficulty 4, 60 bars): in 3/8, a D major subject of eighths and sixteenths with mordents and turns passes between the hands before the opening returns.
• Invention No. 14 in B-flat major, BWV 785 (difficulty 5, 20 bars): in 4/4, a figure in sixteenth and quick thirty-second notes runs over steady eighths as the hands exchange the line.
• Invention No. 2 in C minor, BWV 773 (difficulty 5, 27 bars): a 4/4 canon where a trilled C minor melody in the right hand is followed two bars later an octave lower by the left hand, which takes the lead halfway through.
• Invention No. 10 in G major, BWV 781 (difficulty 5, 32 bars): in 9/8, a broken-chord eighth-note subject is taken up a bar later by the other hand, with long tied notes against running eighths.
• Invention No. 6 in E major, BWV 777 (difficulty 5, 62 bars): in 3/8 across two repeated halves, one hand falls in syncopated tied notes, at first by semitones, while the other climbs in steady eighths, swapping four bars later.
• Invention No. 13 in A minor, BWV 784 (difficulty 6, 25 bars): in 4/4, leaping sixteenth broken chords and eighth-note answers trade between the hands, peaking in simultaneous leaping sixteenths in bar 19.
• Invention No. 8 in F major, BWV 779 (difficulty 6, 34 bars): in 3/4, a subject climbs an F major triad in eighths and runs down in sixteenths, and the other hand follows it a bar later.
• Invention No. 4 in D minor, BWV 775 (difficulty 6, 52 bars): in 3/8, a sixteenth-note subject enters two bars apart while the middle holds a multi-bar tied note against running sixteenths.

The 1725 notebook for Anna Magdalena Bach holds two minuets long credited to Bach, plus an anonymous minuet and musette. Because the two minuets are now attributed to Christian Petzold (the G minor one usually, although the notebook names no composer) and the other two are anonymous, we list them separately at difficulty 2–3:

• Christian Petzold: Minuet in G major, BWV Anh. 114 (difficulty 3, 32 bars, about 1:30): from the 1725 notebook, long credited to Bach and now attributed to Christian Petzold.
• Christian Petzold: Minuet in G minor, BWV Anh. 115 (difficulty 3, 32 bars, about 1:45): from the 1725 notebook, long credited to Bach and now usually attributed to Petzold even though the notebook names no composer.
• Anonymous: Minuet in G major, BWV Anh. 116 (difficulty 3, 40 bars, about 2 minutes): an anonymous 3/4 minuet from the 1725 notebook in two repeated sections of 16 and 24 bars, with half notes, quarters and broken-chord eighths in the bass.
• Anonymous: Musette in D major, BWV Anh. 126 (difficulty 2, 20 bars, 54 seconds): an anonymous piece from the 1725 notebook with a bright two-beat tune, imitating a bagpipe with an octave-leaping left-hand drone, an A major middle and a Da Capo close.

Once you can play Invention No. 8 and Invention No. 13 at tempo, these five works take you from difficulty 6 to 9:

• Invention No. 4 in D minor, BWV 775 (difficulty 6, 52 bars, 46 seconds): in 3/8, a sixteenth-note subject enters two bars apart, and in the middle one hand holds a multi-bar tied note while the other runs on.
• Fugue in C minor (The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book I), BWV 847 (difficulty 6, 31 bars, about 1:25): a three-voice fugue from Book I (1722) in 4/4 where three voices take up a springing subject in turn and close over a held low C.
• Prelude in C minor (The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book I), BWV 847 (difficulty 7, 38 bars, about 1:20): both hands run in steady sixteenths, each of the first 24 bars repeating one broken-chord figure, before a Presto (very fast) over a held low G at bar 28. Bar 34 slows to an Adagio (slow) with rolled chords before a lively closing section ends on a C major chord.
• Sinfonia (Partita No. 2 in C minor, I), BWV 826 (difficulty 7, 91 bars, about 4:20): opens Partita No. 2 (1731, Clavier-Übung Part I) with seven bars of Grave adagio (slow and solemn) in dotted chords. An Andante (at a walking pace) over a walking bass then leads into a two-voice 3/4 fugue.
• Toccata in D major, BWV 912 (difficulty 9, 283 bars, about 9:45): one of seven early keyboard toccatas, moving from a free opening flourish into a lively Allegro (fast and bright). A searching Adagio full of suspensions then gives way to a long 6/16 fugue.