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Easy piano pieces for beginners, free and in teaching order

SheetScroll’s free piano course has 15 public-domain pieces in teaching order, from three right-hand notes to Burgmüller’s Arabesque. Each is a full two-staff piano part that listens and turns its own pages, with no Pro needed. Start it from Setlists → Learn on any device.

Updated

How is the piano course ordered?

It adds one thing at a time, the way piano method books do. The first seven pieces stay inside one or two five-finger positions.

  1. Hot Cross Buns and Mary Had a Little Lamb: three notes (E, D, C), then a fourth, with the right hand alone.
  2. Lightly Row: the left hand alone, in bass clef, before the hands ever play together.
  3. Ode to Joy (theme) and Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star: hands together, first over held bass notes, then with the right hand reaching to A.
  4. Jingle Bells (chorus) and Frère Jacques (round): a new hand position with F♯, then running eighths in a round.
  5. Two minuets from the Notebook for Anna Magdalena Bach: the first real pieces, with two independent voices, 3/4 time, repeats and a minor key.
  6. Schumann, the Musette, Burgmüller and Clementi: a singing legato line, left-hand octave leaps, chords, dotted rhythms, sonata form and fast sixteenths in the Arabesque.

What will I learn?

  • Hands alone before hands together, so each hand learns its job.
  • Held bass notes, then a moving bass, then a melody passed between the hands.
  • Reading both clefs. The left hand starts in bass clef, and Schumann’s Melody writes it in treble clef.
  • Repeats, first and second endings and D.C. al Fine, in the Musette and in Candor.
  • Wider hands: by the Arabesque, the right hand reaches from A3 to A6.

The pieces are public domain: traditional tunes, and works by composers who died long before 1926. Our own CC0 encodings were checked note by note against public-domain editions. They carry no fingerings and no tempo words, so you add your own.

How do I start?

Open Setlists and tap Learn → Piano. In an empty library, tap Learn an instrument. One tap imports the pieces, makes a setlist called Learn piano, and opens the first piece. Each piece carries a note on what it teaches.

Play, and the pages turn themselves: these pieces listen and turn without Pro. A digital piano works over USB or Bluetooth MIDI, and an acoustic piano through the microphone. See the MIDI help.

How should I practice with it?

  • Play each piece until you can go through without stopping, then take the next. The order depends on it.
  • Keep to the learning tempos. They are slower than the pieces’ usual speeds.
  • Pieces 1 to 3 already keep the hands apart. From piece 4 on, try each hand alone, then both.
  • Add your own fingerings with the Finger stamps, found under Annotate.
  • Stop mid-piece? Tap the bar you are on, and SheetScroll finds you again.

What do I play next?

Browse the free piano sheet music, or import your own PDFs, photos and MusicXML. Everything listens the same way. Pro adds listening and automatic turns for scores beyond the course.

The piano page covers more of what SheetScroll does for pianists.

The pieces

Learn piano: From first notes to Burgmüller. 15 pieces, in the order they are played.

  1. Hot Cross Buns, Traditional: Right hand: E, D, C
  2. Mary Had a Little Lamb, Traditional: Four notes, right hand
  3. Lightly Row, Traditional: Left hand alone, bass clef
  4. Ode to Joy (theme), Ludwig van Beethoven: Hands together, held bass notes
  5. Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star, Traditional: Hands together, reaching to A
  6. Jingle Bells (chorus), James Lord Pierpont: G position, both hands
  7. Frère Jacques (round), Traditional: Eighth notes, a round
  8. Minuet in G, BWV Anh. 114, Christian Petzold: First minuet, two voices
  9. Minuet in G minor, BWV Anh. 115, Christian Petzold: Minor key, hand shifts
  10. Melody, Op. 68 No. 1, Robert Schumann: Legato melody, steady eighths
  11. Musette in D, BWV Anh. 126, Anonymous: Left-hand octave leaps
  12. Soldier's March, Op. 68 No. 2, Robert Schumann: Chords and dotted rhythms
  13. Candor, Op. 100 No. 1, Friedrich Burgmüller: Even eighths, legato phrases
  14. Sonatina in C, Op. 36 No. 1, first movement, Muzio Clementi: Scales, sonata form
  15. Arabesque, Op. 100 No. 2, Friedrich Burgmüller: Fast sixteenths, staccato chords

Start this course

In the app: Setlists → Learn.

Questions

Are the piano pieces really free?

Yes. The course is part of the free reader, and its pieces listen and turn pages without Pro.

Are the pieces public domain?

Yes. They are traditional tunes and works by composers who died long before 1926, in our own CC0 encodings.

Do I need to read music already?

No. The course starts with three notes in the right hand and adds one new thing in each piece.

Can my teacher change the order?

A course is an ordinary setlist, so you can rename it, reorder it, add pieces and write notes.