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Funny enough, I found one in Bach just yesterday! I have a student (my only student at the moment due to the virus mess, and also my current landlady) who is working through the Little Preludes. I was looking through BWV 941, Prelude in E minor, and there is an instance of 3:2 polyrhythm in the penultimate bar. Here is a link to a public domain edition of BWV 941.

AZN, would you swing the eight notes here? I had intended to use this to introduce my student to polyrhythm. (She's Grade 4 ABRSM, and has heard me playing a lot of polyrhythms in some of my diploma repertoire.)

Yikes, Dr. Rogers, what are you doing with those 19th-century editions?? You use that to teach?

Anyway, for that piece, your 19th-century editor already provided you with a possible solution. The first two triplets are played like 16th notes, and the last triplet is like an 8th note, and therefore aligned vertically with the other 8th notes.

What I would do is to start a ritardando on the first two triplets all the way to the end. It might be too "Romantic" for some Baroque purists, but I think the tempo and mood of this piece would make a ritardando sound good.

The Palmer edition suggests that the 2-against-3 rhythm could be played as is, even though it's very rare. So I guess you could use this piece to teach polyrhythm.

I'm gleaning interpretive ideas from them. I'm not a Baroque purist, and while I do think we should keep Baroque practice and instrumental limitations in mind, I do not consider myself bound by them. (What I won't do is use the damper pedal. I wouldn't rule it out for very, very rare use, but generally I keep my foot away from it.)

I'm not a big fan of most of those old editions, with the exception of Busoni. I like most of Busoni's interpretations, but again, I do not feel myself bound by them. Another 19th-century editor to whom I sometimes refer is Preston Ware Orem, though I generally prefer Busoni.

I usually teach from Henle or from my own settings, but I extract ideas from those 19th-century editions and pencil them in on the Urtext.


I think I agree with you on this. That's probably how I'll approach it with her.


One of these days I should get the Palmer edition of the Preludes. I have a soft spot for Professor Palmer. And I actually knew his son for some years before I realized that his father was the Professor Palmer!

Well, the one you linked isn't horrible. I have seen 19th-century editions that absolutely BUTCHERED the music--removing sections, taking out (or writing in the wrong) ornaments, changing notes, and--god forbid--adding measures and extra notes!! And this is in addition to the commonplace addition of pedal marks, long slurs, and dynamics.

I must say Busoni was one of the worst offenders. Czerny was horrid, and even some of the stuff Longo did was inexplicable.

But I like your idea of teaching from an urtext edition. My students' parents are too cheap to buy the expensive editions, but now they have a lot of free editions on imslp.