Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Adult Beginners Forum Beethoven Moonlight Sonata, third movement

I've always thought of this piece as belonging to the super-difficult, virtuoso repertoire. It sounds fiendishly difficult, and incredibly impressive. I've often seen it cited here as a piece that people dream of being able to play one day. I well remember a few years ago, browsing the sheet music in my favourite music shop when somebody trying out a piano hammered out a flawless, barnstorming, performance of it that left me absolutely stunned (and with a severely reduced appetite for the early-intermediate fare I was browsing in the search for something new to play).

Back in the same shop today, I picked up the latest edition of Pianist, and noticed that this movement is included in the score section. I was almost as stunned as I was on that day years ago to see that the piece is marked 'Intermediate/Advanced' (NOT 'Advanced') ! I quote from the comments at the top of
the score - "Don't be put off by the presto tempo... if you practice it carefully, building up the tempo ever so slowly, you will reach a lively tempo in no time.".

Could this really be an 'Intermediate/Advanced' piece, and hence accessible to ordinary mortals in general and Adult Beginners in particular ? I'd love to read any thoughts on this, especially if you've had a go at playing it.

I learned the 1st mmt in my youth, never even heard of the 3rd mmt until later in my adult life and was also blown away by it. Definately beyond intermediate but there is much tougher stuff in the advanced literature. My teacher says with pieces such as these to just keep recycling them through the years and it will all come. When you see a video of Kempff playing this you have to realize he has been working on it for all his life.

PS I did the music shop thing myself with this very piece. I sat down at an upright and played the first page or so. When I finished a guy told my how fantastic it was. I sort of deflected the praise by saying how nice the piano sounded. He agreed and said, in fact, he was in the process of buying it. I was embarassed and apologized. He said "No,no, I can barely play...yet but it was great to hear the potential of what my new piano can sound like!

It's a difficult piece. I would probably put it in the advanced category. I tried to learn it once quite a while ago and couldn't do it. I haven't tried in a long time, but maybe I should and see whether I've improved. I'm not sure there are any technical difficulties with it that can't be overcome with enough practice (just like any piece I guess), but to play it up to speed and make it sound good is the challenge. I've heard people on this forum say that it is not very hard, but if they really think that, I'd like to hear a recording of them playing it.

The third movement of the Moonlight is eleven pages long (in my ABRSM edition) and only 14 of the 200 bars repeat in the recapitulation.

Each page has enough technical difficulty to last at least a week each for anyone without a well rounded technique. There aren't any 'easy' passages to speak of. That puts the learning time around eleven weeks for someone already capable of fast scale runs, arpeggios and broken chords, a wonderful example of the Alberti bass (continued in RH in the development section and the coda) and extending to a ninth, some rather wicked weak finger trills and some hefty staccato chord passages.

There's little that can't be overcome with sufficient practise (though small hands are very disadvantaged) but you won't be approaching 160 bpm anytime soon.



'Adult Beginners' are those that started or returned in adulthood; that encompasses a wide range of skills and abilities. This is not a piece to tackle immediately after Alfred's third AIO book. I think an Intermediate (ABRSM grade 6/RCM 8) would be able to get this up to a moderato within six months given sufficient patience and effective practise methods. The piece is perfectly adequate musically (and still quite impressive) at an allegro.

I learnt the piece in 1979 and currently practise it around 108 bpm. If I play it over 120 I have to compromise the trills and I haven't managed to play the whole of it over 132 since I returned to the piano last Christmas though I can still do most of it in sections at 144. I didn't use a metronome back in the day but I doubt that I ever got it up to a full 160.

Interesting replies - having read them, and having got home and read the score (and slowly picked through some parts of it) I think this is a case where Pianist have seriously mis-graded the piece. I was asking the question because I was surprised to see it described as intermediate-advanced and wondered if it might not be one of those pieces that sounds much more difficult than it is, like CPE Bach's Solfeggietto for example, that can be worked up to a fast tempo with a reasonable amount of practice.


Coming from someone who has practiced the piece and spent time with it, I guess that puts it into perspetive how difficult it really is. That sounds about as hard as I would have thought it is from listening to it. My personal view is that if a piece is taking that long to learn, it's beyond your level and you could have worked on half-a-dozen pieces that would have helped build your technique instead. A lot of people are quite happy to do this though, especially on pieces like this. It's just not for me.

I guess I won't be tackling this any time soon. The Fibich piece and the Fauré Song without Words in the same edition look more like it for me.

It is NOT ARBSM 6 or RCM 8! That would also be a HUGE leap in difficulty of songs between the levels and the Moonlight.

This piece is Intermediate/Advanced in advanced repertoire. The same way the Pathetique is "Easy." It is "Easy Advanced." The Moonlight is "Intermediate Advanced."

That said, I don't think there are very many pieces out there that late starters cannot learn. There are people here learning advanced Chopin, Ravel, Debussy, etc. It just depends on how much you practice!

You are very encouraging! I will never be able to play Moonlight nor anything by Chopin- I am 44- not got enough years left in me to get to grade 8 or beyond- I expect that those aforementioned are way beyond grade 8.

Do not sell yourself short. It is completely possible.

44 is nothing! With practice, grade 8 is more than achievable.

Anyone of normal intelligence, missing hands and fingers notwithstanding, can learn piano up to grade 8. Those that do typically have teachers and tend not to take more than 10 years. Many start in retirement and take less than that. Grade 8 is nothing special - it's a starting point; at that stage well over 90% of the classical piano repertoire is within your grasp and you can progress without a teacher.

Let me clarify my earlier post in case it was misunderstood, the Moonlight Presto Agitato is a tough grade 8 piece and a strong memoriser will do better than a gifted reader but, I reiterate, a grade 6 player (one tackling grade 7 pieces not one just finished grade 5) could get it up to moderato within six months with effective practise methods.



It just depends on how much you practise! (Please forgive the liberty)

In my opinion the moonlight sonata is one of the easiest Beethoven piano sonatas. It's very doable for anyone who has reached ABRSM grade 8 level. Intermediate/ Advanced level is a very appropriate level for this piece. Giving it an Advanced level would imply keeping it with the intermediate sonatas like Op.2 No3., Op7, Op.28, Op.31(all three), Op.54, Op.81a, Op.90, which are technically and musically far harder than Op.27 No.2. Don't be frightened by the fast tempo, c-sharp minor fits well with the hands. And don't attempt it if you're going to play it at moderato, it would sound ugly. Vivace is a minimum. Try playing Op.49 first, and if it comes to you easily then maybe you could try the moonlight. Any "mortal" can play it with some effort. But do not try the last five sonatas under any circumstances for the next 3-4 years( do not try the Op.106 if you started so late. Professional are afraid of it!). They are incredibly hard. Out of curiosity, please listen to Op.110 and tell me whether you think it sounds harder than the moonlight sonata.

Practice is the British spelling. Are you American?

Unless you plan on kicking the bucket at 50 (which is statistically unlikely), you can achieve whatever you want to. Even assuming you were to live no longer than 50, quite a large amount could be achieved in that time on the piano, even if you had zero experience.

Thank you for clarifying. I just wanted to make sure that no one would assume the level is easier than Grade 8! It isn't impossible, but it is tough.

And yes, you are absolutely correct. Of course, if you aren't practicing correctly, you aren't really practicing at all! That's the mentality I have with this.

arpan70, practice is also the American spelling. Also, Moonlight is not one of the easiest Beethoven sonatas. There are many more that are much less demanding musically and technically. Of course for professionals and more advanced players, it will not seem so as we tackle the 'Great 4 Sonatas' or any of the much more difficult ones, but in the relative sense, Moonlight is up there.

Let me pick you up on, er, all your points. There is little profit from trying to agree on the order of difficulty of Beethoven's sonatas until we all have the same hand configuration and preferences. I can't see Op. 90 as that difficult even if you can't stretch the tenth. And, discounting Opp. 49, 14 and 79, being one of the easiest doesn't mean much among such summits.


I regularly practise the Presto at moderato (as I do all presto's) and it doesn't sound ugly to me (maybe it's the way I play?). It might sound ugly and lose its clarity at recital speed if I didn't practise it moderato! Vivace is generally used as a mood rather than a tempo indication and has been ascribed to anything between allegro and largo. I used moderato as an indication of progress for a grade 6 pianist not as a target speed for performance. Recital speed, once a piece is in memory, is simply, pardon the pun, a matter of time (and slow practise).


Since the last five Beethoven sonatas are worthy of a lifetime's study, when do you think that study should begin? When one can play them up to tempo? Op. 106 can be started as soon as you fall in love with the Largo. I wouldn't wait until you can play the fugue.


I have enough experience that I know not to judge the difficulty of a piece by the hearing.


Practice is the American spelling of verb and noun. In Britain we use -s- for the verb and -c- for the noun if I may take licence to advise on British practice in defence of my spelling

I guess I'll try to go through you're points as well.

I mean't easy relatively, it is still hard to bring out the strange quasi-sonata structure in the sonata. However, Beethoven wrote a lot harder stuff. Op.90 requires much more maturity. My teacher,(who has done many Beethoven sonatas) was very against my trying Op.90, and made me settle for Op.31 no.2.

And there is a difference between practice speed and performance speed. I take back my vivace, just wrote it as an indication which is generally regarded to be faster than moderato and allegro. But what's the point of playing a piece for 6 months but not being able to do justice to it?

As for the last 5 sonatas, I had said wait for 3-4 years. And the Hammerklavier isn't very appropriate for someone who started at the age of 44. If he does reach that level, he'll have a very good teacher, and he'll be good enough to disregard my advise which is for beginner/intermediate.

And about the Op.110, my curiosity doesn't extend to someone like you, who is familiar with the Beethoven sonatas, but to someone who isn't.(It's also a cheap way to expose people to late Beethoven)


And I apologize for the grammer part. Guess its really my domain.

I was amused by the "intermediate/advanced" level assigned to this by Pianist magazine. For any beginners reading this thread who are unclear which piece we are talking about, have a look at this superb rendition

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zucBfXpCA6s

It's definitely on my list of pieces to learn, but I'm nowhere near ready to tackle it.

Really? Have you met any adults who achieved this? I have been told by many piano teachers that this is not possible. The reasons they gave were- late starting ( not enough living years left to learn), adults haven't the learning ability of children who they say learn two grades a year and leap way ahead of adult learners, old slow hands.
I was told there are some exceptions and one teacher told me of a man in his 60s who was grade 5-6 but it had took him 10 years to get to it.

Nearly there, arpan70


Strange quasi-sonata structure? Are we still talking about the Presto agitato? The sonata structure is crystal clear. Exposition - first group: 1-20, second group: 21-64, Dev.: 65-101, Recap - first group: 102-115, second group: 116-156, Coda: 157-200. No?

Because it might take longer than six months, perhaps? Or for the sheer pleasure of learning? If you have enough musical meat on the bone and you're learning other stuff besides then there's no time limit. You don't have to do justice to it, you just have to enjoy the learning process.

I'm tackling Liszt's B minor sonata. Six months? No chance. I may never finish it but that doesn't take away from the joy of becoming increasingly intimate with one of the finest pieces in the piano literature and the sheer ecstasy of playing the extracts I have managed to develop.

I take it you're very young, id est, under 44. Don't underestimate the human learning process. It's not the starting age that matters nor the time taken. Hey, it's not even the point reached - it's the journey.

Piano playing is not a language. You don't have to master it by the age of ... whatever. It's a technique. You can start at any age and still make the same progress you would have made before. And very few of us make significant progress after about ten years. So with a life expectancy of 80, it's best to start by 70. But that doesn't mean that starting at 75 is too late.

And don't put the Hammerklavier on such a pedestal. It doesn't have to be tackled with a view to performing it at Carnegie Hall (in six months time, hah!).

And there's no need to apologise about the grammar. Just the spelling!
Just kidding!!

.

Well my intelligence must be ok as I graduated from university LOL and I have all my fingers (albiet some are crooked..maybe a problem for me...).
I did think grade 8 is very hard and not everyone can do it- some of those pop musicians are not grade 8.





I think Beethoven was amazing!!

Fingers are only crooked if they're in someone else's pockets! And some of those pop musicians are not even musicians

Grade 8 doesn't require special talents. It looks hard when you're starting out but every grade you achieve brings it one step closer and makes it one step easier. By the time you get to grade seven it's only one step away and many of the pieces you tackle could be used for either grade. By that time it isn't so much what you play as how you play it.

The giant leap is learning how to listen, how to learn and how to practise. And gaining confidence in that process.