Level 4 of 36 · Book I: Single lines
Bass clef sight-reading exercises: left-hand skips
Skips of a third, now in the bass clef. Line to line and space to space looks the same as in the treble clef, which is what makes reading by shape so useful: the shapes carry over even though the note names don’t.
- Left hand alone
- C major
- 4/4 time
- = 60 to start
8 different exercises, each 8 bars. Listen first, or play it yourself: the music waits for each note.
What level 4 adds
The left hand stays in C position below middle C. The melodies mix steps, skips of a third and repeated notes, in whole, half and quarter notes, in C major and 4/4.
What to watch for
- C, E and G in the bass clef are the second, third and top spaces: space to space, a skip each time. Seeing the skip shape matters more than naming each note.
- Finger numbers reverse: a skip up in the left hand goes from 5 to 3, or 3 to 1.
- Mixed moves: a step after a skip lands on the neighbouring key, not the next skip.
How to practise it
- Before playing, run your eye along the line and mark in your head where the skips are.
- If you catch yourself naming notes as treble-clef notes, slow down and read from your C landmark instead.
- Once an exercise feels easy, press “New exercise”: every one is different, so you can’t learn it by heart.
Each exercise is new music, written for this level by the same generator the app uses, so you can’t have learned it by ear. Read it once before you play, keep a steady beat, and play on through mistakes. Play it yourself checks your notes from a MIDI keyboard, the mouse or your computer keys, and Print gives you the music alone, to read at the piano.
A new piece every day, at your level
Pianomi is the app these exercises come from. It listens to your MIDI keyboard, grades every note and every beat, and moves you up the 36 levels as your reading improves. It’s free.