Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Pianist Corner Difficulty rating of these pieces

Hi everyone! How would you rate the following pieces from easiest to hardest? And how would you rate them in preference, from the piece you like the most to the least? Here are the pieces:

Jardins Sous La Pluie (Debussy)
Pagodes (Debussy)
Reflets dans l'eau (Debussy)
Barcarolle (Chopin)
Scherzo no 1 Op 20 (Chopin)
Ballade no 3 Op 47 (Chopin)
Nocturne Op 48 1 (Chopin)
Sonata No 17 Op 31 2 (Beethoven)
Beethoven No 16 Op 31 1 (Beethoven)
Sonata No 27 Op 90 (Beethoven)
Sonata D 794 (Schubert)

There are no easy pieces in this list, and they all have different difficulties. Moreover, one particular technical difficulty may not be as difficult for some as it is for others. As for interpretive difficulties, that would depend upon an individual's experience with the composers in question.

If anyone even takes the trouble to try to rate these pieces, you'll get as many different answers as you will responders, so what is the point, may I ask?

Furthermore, you already asked this question two days ago.

Regards,

The difficulty of each work depends on how well you want to play it.

Ya, I agree with Bruce, especially on the interpretive challenges and "knowing the composers".

Once you get to that level, "difficulty" is completely moot because what you might find easy, I may find difficult, and what I may find a breeze, you may struggle with, and around and around in circles we go.

Is this the piano version of comparing processors and motherboards a la "will my [unnecessarily high specs] run this PC game [from two years ago]?"

Except for maybe the first two listed and possibly the Op.90 Sonata, these are all major works that require the highest level of virtuosity and musicianship. So anyone considering the study of these pieces should be able to judge how difficult they would personally find them. My guess is that in any listing of works and their difficulty, these pieces are all very close in terms of difficulty.

Seriously - just download the whole lot from IMSLP and read through them yourself (assuming you already have the skills to do so - if you haven't, they're all too difficult for you).

That's what I used to do as a student - except that I had to borrow volumes of the stuff from my high school music library, because the www wasn't even a glimmer in anyone's brain cell then (not even Sir Tim's). Now, I have all the volumes (because I can afford to buy them), and just play through them whenever I feel like it.

But if you really want to know, IMO, the easiest piece on the list is by Freddy. The hardest piece is......also by Freddy .

Ditto for the pieces I like most & least.

Is the Op 90 sonata and the first two pieces listed by Debussy the easiest? Or the Op 48 no 1 by Chopin? Are all pieces pretty comparable in difficulty?

Funnily, I keep misreading the title as "Difficulty of rating these pieces."
And actually I think that's better.

Mark C. Bruce. Dead right.

Haven't you already asked this in a different way?
PW Thread

Easy and/or difficult for who? Take a stab at all of them and decide for yourself.

pianosyllabus.com gives these pieces a 9 or 10, so they must be popular

They are all hard.
Op 31 no 2 (Beethoven) is best
Barcarolle (Chopin) is worst by far
Everything else is good.

Great post.
Oh -- there's one mistake there. What you meant was Barcarolle is the #1 piece of all time.

No mistake. Terrible piece from the very start. When I rip a new Chopin CD, I uncheck that piece if it exists. God-awful, wretched piece. I can say without hyperbole that it is a million times worse than any other Chopin piece, including Op 17 no 4, which is many thousands times worse than any other Mazurka.

I can't stand the Barcarolle myself.

By that bach guy. Very Offen.

Is pagodes and jardins easier than refletsdans leau and the mentioned Beethoven sonatas?

I'm currently in the process of compiling a list of the entire piano repertoire in exact order of difficulty so you won't have to ask any more of these questions. I'll notify you when the list is complete.

The repertoire I listed?