“Solfeggietto” was composed by Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach in 1766.  One of the many talented sons of composer J.S. Bach, C.P.E. Bach wrote in the transition period between the Baroque and the Classical style that followed it.  The work is unusual for a keyboard piece in that the main theme and most passages are fully monophonic, that is, only one note is played at a time.

Nearly 220 years elapsed between its publication and my first encounter with it.  The monophonic and easily loopable nature of the piece made it ideally suited for the soundtrack to an early video game.* I immediately pressured my piano teacher to let me learn it, and she managed to locate the sheet music. (Quite the feat in the days before the internet, especially given that the music in the game was uncredited)  I tackled it with gusto, and for many years it remained one of my favorite pieces of music to play.

These days the piece is usually performed on a piano, and is commonly assigned to piano students. It appears in many anthologies; pedagogically it fosters the playing of even sixteenth notes by alternating hands. 

Over time, the Solfeggietto has been subjected to a variety of renditions. It has at least once been given a jazz treatment,** and it has been arranged for heavy metal guitar.†  An adaptation for a player piano exists,‡ and many other permutations, disfigurements, and manglings have been fabricated as well.  

It therefore brings me great pleasure to be able to bring the composition back to the original electronic setting for which C.P.E. Bach intended it to be performed.

 
* “Protector II” from ATARISOFT, © 1983 Atari INC, for the Texas Instruments TI99/4a Home Computer

** “Solfeggio in C Minor” by Eugen Cicero, from “Swinging the Classics on MPS.” (Fun!)

† “Solfeggietto / Pat a Pan (Instrumental)” by Symphony North, released 2019. (Not really my thing, but entertaining nonetheless.)

‡ “Solfeggietto a Cinque” by Marc-André Hamelin, (a goddamned crime against music, in this author’s opinion.)

Solfeggietto in C Minor

Cadence Errata