Always the Right Time to Play
Piano scores to listen, download and play. Searchable by level, composer, style and era
The transition from late-nineteenth-century ragtime to the sophisticated “Mexican” serenades of the early twentieth century represents a pivotal moment in American music history. Scott Joplin, universally acclaimed as the “King of Ragtime,” sought to elevate the genre into the realm…
The Piano Sonata No. 16 in C Major, K. 545, widely known as the “Sonata Facile” (Simple Sonata), stands as one of the most recognizable and pedagogically significant works in the history of Western classical music. Composed by Wolfgang Amadeus…
Edward MacDowell’s “To a Wild Rose” is the quintessential American piano miniature. Published in 1896 as the first movement of the Woodland Sketches, Op. 51, it represents a pivotal moment in American music history where European Romanticism met a distinct New World sensibility.…
The delicate, ethereal sounds of Impressionism find their most perfect expression in Claude Debussy’s “La fille aux cheveux de lin” (The Girl with the Flaxen Hair). As the eighth prelude in his first book of Préludes, this piece stands as…
The “Canon in D Major” by Johann Pachelbel is arguably the most recognizable piece of Baroque music in history. Originally composed around 1680 for three violins and a basso continuo, its transition to the piano has made it a staple…
The discovery of a pristine 1930 score of “Embraceable You” often acts as a transformative moment for a dedicated pianist. One might recall the initial tactile sensation of the heavy paper, the distinct typography of the New World Music Corp.,…
Introduction: My First Encounter with the “Father of the Piano” The Six Progressive Sonatinas Op. 36 are not merely “student pieces”; they are a distilled essence of the High Classical style. To play them well is to understand the very mechanics of…
There are few piano pieces that conjure such immediate recognition and toe-tapping joy as Scott Joplin’s “The Entertainer.” Whether heard on the radio, in old-time movie soundtracks, or through generations of piano students tapping it out on upright pianos, this…
There comes a moment in many pianists’ journeys when the gentle, moonlit strains of Chopin’s Nocturne in E-flat Major, Op. 9 No. 2 begin to drift from their piano for the first time. This beloved nocturne, with its singing melody…
The History of the Music & the Man Behind It Composed between 1888 and 1895, Trois Gymnopédies were first published in Paris in 1898. The pieces are named after ancient Greek “gymnopaedia” festivals, in which young men danced unarmed in…
