Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Pianist Corner What is the meaning of this music notation? [Bach prelude 6]

I was hoping someone could help me figure out what these mean (red box outline):

http://i.imgur.com/odddmC2.jpg

Thanks!

When you begin reading the piece, notice that the right hand is read in the treble clef and the left hand is in the bass clef. The first change means you start reading the left hand in the treble clef so the first LH note after this sign is the C# immediately above middle C. Notice that both the RH and LH staves after this are both in the treble clef. The second sign means you return the left hand to the bass clef.

It just means the lower staff has been changed from bass clef to treble clef to prevent the notes from getting too high on the ledger lines. The small sign is just a warning for the next bar because it's on the next line - and people frequently miss the clef change at the start of a line. On the second line, the small bass clef is a warning that the lower staff is returning to bass clef on the next line.

That's a change of clef, whatever comes after will be played in that clef.

Just by way of a footnote:

In traditional music-engraving practice, the formal term for what Ando has explained is a "cautionary" clef symbol. Actually, it's standard practice (as you can confirm from any score), whenever a change of clef coincides with the start of a bar, to position the clef-change symbol at the very end of the bar preceding it, whether or not this preceding bar is the last bar on a stave. So, in both circumstances, the rule for positioning the symbol is one and the same.