Massenet: Méditation - Easy Piano Arrangement

Jules Massenet: Méditation from Thaïs

PDF Sheet music, piano solo
Simple Solutions piano arrangement by Henrik Kilhamn

Approximate Grade: 4+
Scale 1 - 8: Beginner - Advanced

Key: D major, same as original

This is a gem from the violin repertoire. It’s from the opera Thaïs, played as an instrumental entr’acte as Thaïs reflects on her life choices and contemplating the love of God. Here the melodic line is primarily violinistic, with some long notes meant to be sustained with a bow stroke. Normally this is hard to keep on piano, but fortunately the accompaniment has these iconic arpeggios that create maximum resonance across all the strings of our instrument! So the melodic sound is sustained, albeit in a different way than on the violin. Originally the arpeggios continue over all 8th notes but here they stop on the last beat to give you time to jump down and find the start of the next group. The rhythmic flow doesn’t stop because the melody always plays more notes at the end of the bars and thus makes for a good compromise.

This arrangement is included in Simple Solutions Volume 5 - A Burning Desire (Intermediate ~ Grade 3-5)

ABOUT SIMPLE SOLUTIONS

The Simple Solutions series came from the idea that even not-professionally trained pianists should be able to enjoy the feeling of playing great music from the piano repertoire with their own hands. This is possible with some clever rearranging of the musical material: reducing the range of independent voices and jumps while preserving core ideas of melody and rhythm. In this easier setting, you will instead have enough time on your hands (literally!) to bring the music to life and care about those aspect that often otherwise come second: phrasing, articulation, dynamics, and balance. This will help you develop your over-all musicality, which will be of great value in all other pieces as well.

In the end, if you feel ready for a challenge and want to go forward with proper piano studies that requires years of practice – you can always move on to more advanced arrangements or original piano compositions. They will always be there. In the meantime, these arrangements will bring you close to the same enjoyment as the full versions, because all musical ideas are carefully conserved.

They are just a little bit easier.