Preparatory School, Op. 101 No. 21
Ferdinand Beyer (1803–1863) · sheet music
- Time 4/4
- Levels 2–3
- Passages 5
Your turn · both hands
Preparing your passage…
Ferdinand Beyer, German romantic (1803–1863). The reading release has 5 passages from this piece at levels 2–3; the reader above opens on the easiest, bars 5–8 for the right hand alone.
The hardest stretch is bars 1–8 at level 3.
Your practice path
Learn it the way teachers do: each hand on its own, then together, then the hard bars. Each step is a real graded passage of Preparatory School, Op. 101 No. 21.
- Right hand alone · bars 5–8 level 2
- The hardest bars · bars 1–8 level 3
How to play Preparatory School, Op. 101 No. 21
- Tempo:Moderato in the Peters edition: a calm count in which each half note is two clear beats and nothing feels rushed when a skip arrives.
- Right hand:With the thumb on C and finger 5 on G the skips need no stretch; the printed 3 then 1 for E to C keeps the hand still.
- Fingering:The Peters edition prints 2 and 4 on the D and F of the closing turn, so D-F-E-D runs 2-4-3-2.
- Left hand:The left hand's C-G-E-G pattern carries printed fingers 5-1-3-1; once it is in the fingers, your attention can stay on the right hand.
- Hands together:Each right-hand half note lasts for two left-hand quarter notes, so let the left hand's pulse tell you when the right hand moves.
- Practice:Isolate the G-to-C drop: look at C while finger 5 is still on G, play the pair slowly several times, then rejoin the phrase.
- Reading:Say the size of each move before playing it, third down, step down, fifth down, rather than naming every note.
Common mistakes
- Leaving the high G early to get ready for the drop. Fix: Hold the G its full two beats, move the eye to C, then move the thumb.
- Rushing the quarter-note turn at the end of each phrase. Fix: Play it at the speed of the left hand's quarter notes.
- Playing the two D's as one long note. Fix: Lift slightly and replay the D so both half notes sound.
Structure: rounded binary (second half repeated)
The first half states the falling thirds twice and closes with a quarter-note turn onto C. Behind the repeat sign, the second half pits repeated D's against the drop from G to C and then repeats the first half's second phrase note for note.
- A · Falling thirds
- Half notes E to C, twice, then two D's and a step from G to F. Judge each skip as a distance before you play it.
- B · Fifth drop
- Repeated D's alternate with a high G that falls straight to C, the widest move in the melody.
- A · Return
- The falling thirds come back and the turn D-F-E-D settles on a half note C.
About Preparatory School, Op. 101 No. 21
In No. 21 the right hand stops walking by step and starts to skip. Its opening half notes drop a third from E to C twice, sit on two D's, and then step from G down to F, so nearly every new note is a small jump the eye has to judge before the finger moves.
Underneath, the left hand plays legato quarter notes circling through C, G, E, and G, a broken-chord pattern that keeps the pulse going while the right hand holds. In the repeated second half the right hand's high G falls straight to C, a full fifth and the widest drop in the piece, before the opening phrase returns and a short turn, D-F-E-D, leads home.
Both hands use the same five notes, C to G, and the Peters edition prints both on treble staves with the left hand an octave lower. Alfred's modern edition notes that Beyer wrote some early pieces on two treble staves and rewrites them with a bass clef.
- Beyer's book reached Japan with the American educator Luther Whiting Mason, who came to teach for the Meiji government in 1880, and PTNA calls it the cornerstone of piano teaching there.
- In the Peters edition, a side-by-side comparison of treble-clef and bass-clef notes comes right after No. 50, well after this two-treble-staff study.
Why the first passage is level 2
That passage is level 2 rather than 1 because it leaps a major third.
Five notes, C to G, and no sharps or flats: read the half-note skips as distances, and treat the closing turn as one small shape.
Questions about Preparatory School, Op. 101 No. 21
- How hard is Preparatory School, Op. 101 No. 21 to play?
- Its passages grade from level 2 to level 3 on Real Sight Reader's ten-level reading scale, which keeps all of it within beginner reading. The hardest stretch is bars 1–8 at level 3.
- Is there an easy part of Preparatory School, Op. 101 No. 21 for beginners?
- Yes. Start with bars 5–8 for the right hand alone, the level-2 passage in the reader at the top of this page; it is level 2 because it leaps a major third.
- What key and time signature is Preparatory School, Op. 101 No. 21 in?
- The engraving on this page is in 4/4 time.
- Who composed Preparatory School, Op. 101 No. 21?
- Ferdinand Beyer, German romantic (1803–1863). In No.
- Can I practice Preparatory School, Op. 101 No. 21 online for free?
- Yes. The reader on this page plays any of the 5 graded passages from Preparatory School, Op. 101 No. 21 in your browser, with an on-screen keyboard or a MIDI keyboard, and marks every note as you play. No signup.
- Why is Beyer's book so widely used in Japan?
- PTNA traces it to Luther Whiting Mason, who brought it to Japan in 1880 for the government's music investigation office; Japanese publishers still issue many editions.
- How long does No. 21 take to play?
- PTNA lists a playing time of about 50 seconds.
- Why are both hands written in treble clef?
- Beyer wrote many early pieces on two treble staves, as Alfred's edition notes, and the Peters edition sets out a treble-and-bass-clef comparison right after No. 50.
Every passage, easiest first
The reading release grades 5 distinct passages of this piece. Open any of them in the reader:
- Level 2
- bars 5–8 right hand
- Level 3
- bars 1–8 right hand · bars 1–4 right hand · bars 9–12 right hand · bars 9–16 right hand
More pieces to sight-read
Score: public-domain engraving from the corpus (imslp-omr), graded by the piano-reading-v2-20261023-identity-audit reading release.