I am very interested for those pianists who have learnt any of the 32 Beethoven Sonatas to share their experiences of these works. I would especially like to know which Sonata or movement from a Sonata is the most difficult from their point of view.

The Finale to the Hammerklavier (oh how ironic!) and Waldstein are KILLERs of a movement to do.

Naturally, the Pathetique, Moonlight, Appassionata and other overplayed sonatas are hard to do well because they are simply overplayed!

No.20 is probably the easiest of the sonatas and very charming to play!

I think there's certainly a great range of difficulty in his sonatas. The Hammerklavier is surely one of the hardest, if not the hardest - I definitely wouldn't want to tackle it. I learnt "Das Lebewohl" last year & really loved it, although I still need to spend some more time on it. I think it's a question of getting the right one to suit a person's technique & temperament - there's a wide range of mood as well as technical difficulty.

For many years the Hammerklavier was considered unplayable.

I've heard John Lill perform the Hammerklavier many times. It's certainly unplayable for me! It has to be the most difficult of all though I would imagine.

Robodoc, you were saying about some of the Sonatas being overplayed. Did you mean by professionals or by anybody?

I personally think they are one of the most unique collections of works by any composer and are quite simply timeless masterpieces of art. For me, they can never be overplayed becuase I think there is always something new to discover either for listener or player. That's just my opinion though!

I am currently working on the final movement of the Moonlight and have also this year learnt opus 54 which seems to be rarely performed. It's delightful though.

Well I can manage about half of them in entirety, and certain other movements. The Hamerklavier is by some way the hardest. Actually all the last 5 are not easy to bring off performance wise .
I agree the last movement of the Waldstein is much harder than the other movements, but not as hard as some make out. Same applies to the Appassionata. I struggle with parts of 'Les Adieux'

So as a rough guide for me:-

Easiest are Op49 (both), Op14 (both), Op79, Op10 1 and 2 (3 is a little harder) , Op2 (both) , Op 22.

In a 'hard' category I put the last 5 sonatas, 'Les adieux' 'Waldstein' 'Appassionata'

The others fall somewhere in between.

About 6 months ago I reported I had an old 'Bosworth' edition of all the sonatas arranged in order of difficulty (according to the editor), and I gave the list in a post . Im not sure if its still on here.

No, Irish loony said they were overplayed. I think I know what he means though. Thinking about it a bit more, I suspect that, on the contrary, the professionals don't play the really popular ones (eg Moonlight and Pathethique) as often as they might if they weren't so popular. The problem is that these are the sort of pieces which inspire people to want to play in the first place, so amateurs (like me) tackle them too early, too often and murder them.

There are several pieces that make up "the reason I want to play piano" for me. The Moonlight and the Pathethique are two of them. Others are Chopin's Ballades, Schumann's Etudes Symphonique, Liszt's Paganini study No.3 ("La Campanella" - fiendish) and Liebestraum No. 3; I think I see a separate thread coming . . .

Well for me, I have played..........

Op 49 No 1 1st movement. Harder than it appears I think, I did it for Grade 5 and really enjoyed it. I have recently assigned it to a Grade6-7 pupil who seems to find it quite a challenge....... again, what one person finds hard.......

Sonata in D Op 28 2nd movement. I did this for Grade 7, very challenging to do well I think but lovely

Op 14 No 1 1st movement. I did this one for Grade 8, again a challenging work and probably not very well suited to those with small hands, many octaves and some chords greater than an octave

Pathetique........Hmmm, I did this for my DipABRSM which I failed......twice......you do the math!! The LH tremolos in the first movement make me tremolo

And of course....Moonlight I love this The first movemt is beautiful but often played badly by people who think it is easy because it is slow too loud, too fast, inappropriate balance etc...

The 3rd movement.........this is a work currently in progress...... One day I WILL master it

My goals with regards to Beethoven are ......
3rd movement Moonlight
Appassionata complete
Waldstein complete
Sonata in Ab Op 26 complete
Sonata in D minor Op 31 No 2 complete
Sonata............. hmmm,

ALL of them actually

I love Beethoven

I'm "playing" the Appasionata and the Moonlight at the moment for "fun" Probably not fun for anyone listening to me though

I have played several of the others but am dreadful with opus numbers. I love Beethoven's sonatas and quite often listen to them on CD when i'm round the house.

Just found a midi version of what I believe to be the finale of Hammerklavier.. even the poor midi sounds are getting confused! Anybody got a link to a real person playing it!

I'm learning Sonata in Eb opus 31 no 3 at the moment. No idea how hard it is compared to the others - it's on the LRSM list, and when I played through the Beethoven sonatas on the list, I liked this one best! I'd be interested to know how it compares to the others on the list if anyone knows?

I've got a recording of Brendel playing it - with a dose of the salts I think. My version will be a little more...sedate - if I don't want to come to a complete collapse in the middle of the final movement!

It will be my life time's achievement if I managed to study all 32 sonatas... I have not really worked on last 6 sonatas yet...

My favourite ones so far are: Pathetique, Appassionata, Tempest and Quasi Fantasia (the one after Moonlight). I just love the slow movement of Appassionata!

Just found your list in an old post:



Some differing opinions on the matter here .