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Lesson in A Major

Jeremiah Clarke (1674–1707) · sheet music

  • Key A major
  • Time 6/8
  • Levels 6–9
  • Passages 11

Your turn · both hands

 

 

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Jeremiah Clarke, English baroque (1674–1707). The reading release has 11 passages from this piece at levels 6–9; the reader above opens on the easiest, bars 1–8 for the left hand alone.

Practice the hard bars →

The hardest stretch is bars 1–12 at level 9.

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 Lesson in A Major.

  1. Right hand alone · bars 1–8 level 6
  2. Left hand alone · bars 1–8 level 6
  3. Hands together · bars 11–14 level 6
  4. The hardest bars · bars 1–12 level 9

How to play Lesson in A Major

  1. Tempo:Take the 6/8 at a speed where you can feel two big pulses per bar; if you have to count all six eighths to stay together, slow down.
  2. Left hand:The left hand moves in leaps of up to an octave and more, so practice the jumps alone, landing on the bass note before the right hand enters.
  3. Right hand:Treat the right hand's sixteenth-note groups as small scale fragments in A major and keep the fingers curved and close to the keys.
  4. Hands together:The left hand enters a bar after the right with the same tune two octaves lower, so play the two lines as a conversation and let each shape its own phrase.
  5. Fingering:Mark your fingering at the leaps and the ledger-line notes above the staff, and stay with the same choices every time.
  6. Dynamics:On harpsichord the music relied on articulation rather than dynamics, so on piano shape phrases with a light lift at cadences rather than big crescendos.
  7. Practice:Loop each two-bar fragment slowly with a metronome, add one fragment at a time, and only join the hands once each hand is smooth alone.
  8. Reading:Three sharps (F, C, G) apply throughout; check each line against the A major scale before you start.

Common mistakes

  • Playing the 6/8 as if it were 3/4 or 2/4 with uneven eighths. Fix: Tap two beats per bar and speak the pattern 'one-and-a two-and-a' before playing.
  • Missing the left-hand leaps because the eyes are on the right hand. Fix: Learn the left hand alone until you can find each bass note without looking.
  • Overusing the sustain pedal. Fix: Keep the pedal off or very light so the imitating lines stay crisp and separate, as they would on a harpsichord.
  • Dropping the third sharp (G) in fast runs. Fix: Practice the A major scale in the same rhythm before each run.

Structure: dance suite (Almand, Round O, Jigg)

A suite of this period strings together contrasting dances in one key. Clarke's Lesson in A has three: an Almand, a Round O and a Jigg. The page's passages are in 6/8 and open with the left hand imitating the right-hand tune a bar later, the lively compound-time style of a jig.

1 · Almand
The opening dance of the suite and the first of its three contrasting movements.
2 · Round O
The middle dance; Round O was an English name for the rondeau, in which a refrain keeps returning, as in Purcell's well-known Round O from Abdelazer.
3 · Jigg
The closing dance; jigs are quick and in compound time, like the 6/8 music on this page, where the hands chase each other with the same tune.

About Lesson in A Major

Jeremiah Clarke (c. 1674-1707) was an English composer and organist who worked at St Paul's Cathedral and the Chapel Royal in London. He is best known for the Prince of Denmark's March, the tune now called the Trumpet Voluntary, which was credited to Henry Purcell for decades before the attribution was corrected.

This Lesson in A major is a three-movement suite: an Almand, a Round O and a Jigg. It was printed in London in 1711, four years after Clarke's death, in Choice Lessons for the Harpsichord or Spinett, whose title page says Clarke had corrected the music himself.

In English keyboard publications of the time, lesson was a common name for a suite or keyboard piece, which is why IMSLP also lists this work as Suite in A. Purcell's harpsichord suites had appeared in 1696 under a similar title, A Choice Collection of Lessons.

  • The famous Trumpet Voluntary is by Clarke, not Purcell; he wrote it around 1700, and it was misattributed to Purcell from the late nineteenth century until the 1940s.
  • Clarke's death date is usually given as 1 December 1707, but Burney and Fétis give 16 July and the first edition of Hawkins's history gives 5 November.
  • Choice Lessons was printed for the London publishers Charles King, John Young and John Hare.

Why the first passage is level 6

That passage is level 6 rather than 5 because it is in 6/8, not 4/4.

The left hand copies the right hand's opening a bar later, two octaves down: read the right-hand line first, then recognize it again in the bass clef before joining the hands.

Questions about Lesson in A Major

How hard is Lesson in A Major to play?
Its passages grade from level 6 to level 9 on Real Sight Reader's ten-level reading scale, so the full piece is intermediate to advanced reading. The hardest stretch is bars 1–12 at level 9.
Is there an easy part of Lesson in A Major for beginners?
Its easiest passage is level 6, so it suits a reader past the beginner stage. Start with bars 1–8 for the left hand alone, the level-6 passage in the reader at the top of this page; it is level 6 because it is in 6/8, not 4/4.
What key and time signature is Lesson in A Major in?
Lesson in A Major is in A major, 3 sharps. The engraving on this page is in 6/8 time.
Who composed Lesson in A Major?
Jeremiah Clarke, English baroque (1674–1707). Jeremiah Clarke (c.
Can I practice Lesson in A Major online for free?
Yes. The reader on this page plays any of the 11 graded passages from Lesson in A Major in your browser, with an on-screen keyboard or a MIDI keyboard, and marks every note as you play. No signup.
What does lesson mean in this title?
In English keyboard books of the late 1600s and early 1700s, a lesson was a keyboard piece or suite; IMSLP lists this one as Suite in A as well.
Was this written for piano or harpsichord?
The 1711 collection was titled for the harpsichord or spinet, and IMSLP lists harpsichord and clavichord; it works well on piano with a light, detached touch.
Is Clarke's Lesson in A in the public domain?
Yes. Clarke died in 1707 and the music was printed in 1711, so it is public domain; modern editions can still carry their own editorial copyright.

Every passage, easiest first

The reading release grades 11 distinct passages of this piece. Open any of them in the reader:

Level 6
bars 1–8 left hand · bars 1–8 right hand · bars 9–10 right hand · bars 11–14 both hands · bars 13–16 both hands · bars 15–18 both hands
Level 7
bars 1–8 both hands · bars 1–4 both hands · bars 5–8 both hands
Level 9
bars 1–12 both hands · bars 9–12 both hands

More pieces to sight-read

Score: public-domain engraving from the corpus (pdmx), graded by the piano-reading-v2-20261023-identity-audit reading release.

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