All 32 Beethoven Sonatas RANKED By Difficulty

All 32 Beethoven Sonatas Ranked! Enjoy this video guys, I know difficulty is subjective but I try to come to a "reasonable" conclusion from having played about 10 sonatas and being familiar with all of them to some extent.

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beethoven sonatas
all beethoven sonatas ranked
beethoven sonatas from easiest to hardest
hardest beethoven sonatas
easiest beethoven sonatas
beethoven appassionata
beethoven waldstein
beethoven op. 106
beethoven op. 111
beethoven pathetique
beethoven difficulty sonatas
beethoven henle rating
beethoven sonatas imslp

[PianoTechSupport]

Quick comment, I KNOW that lists and difficulties are subjective so some choices might be a surprise, still the point of this video was also to give people a list of pieces to chose from in any category so pls keep that in mind and enjoy the vid!

[alanhans]

Interesting take. I appreciate how you move beyond technical difficulty to consider the musical dimensions when deciding on level of difficulty.

[maquina]

(Painless)
1:33 op.49/2 (20)
1:41 op.49/1 (19)
2:04 op.79 (25, "Cuckoo")
2:08 op.14/2 (10)
2:12 op.14/1 (9)
2:23 op.2/1 (1)
2:26 op.2/2 (2)
2:28 op.10/1 (5)
2:31 op.10/2 (6)

(Advanced)
2:54 op.13 (8, "Pathétique")
3:06 op.27/2 (14, "Moonlight")
3:16 op.27/1 (13)
3:27 op.28 (15, "Pastoral")
3:33 op.54 (22)
3:44 op.22 (11)

(Demanding)
3:49 op.78 (24, "A Thérèse")
3:55 op.26 (12)
4:02 op.31/1 (16)
4:09 op.31/2 (17, "Tempest")
4:42 op.90 (27)
4:48 op.10/3 (7)
4:54 op.2/3 (3)
4:57 op.31/3 (18, "The Hunt")
5:04 op.81a (26, "Les Adieux/Das Lebewohl")
5:20 op.101 (28)

(Elite)
5:43 op.7 (4)
6:17 op.109 (30)
6:26 op.53 (21, "Waldstein")
7:22 op.110 (31)
7:57 op.57 (23, "Appassionata")
9:15 op.106 (29, "Hammerklavier")
9:23 op.111 (32)

[ep]

The first time I ever heard opus 111 I felt like I was being taken on a musical journey to a place I had never been before. I had a score to follow along with and was astonished at what I was seeing. An experience never to be forgotten.

[VeganChefRon]

I agree. Technically the Hammerklavier is the most difficult, but interpretation on Opus 111 is mind altering and perhaps the most challenging in all of the piano repeteur.

[pavlenikacevic]

I don't see how Op. 101 isn't in the elite, the fugue gets almost as difficult as in Op. 106

I understand your points for placing Op. 111 above Op. 106, but I don't really agree as the third movement of Op. 106 also has immense musical difficulties, almost on par with the Op. 111 arietta, but technically the whole sonata is on a different planet

Nevertheless, a nice video, and I'm looking forward to the future videos!

[imdarealani]

Wow! Someone asked for just the hardest sonatas, but you gave them all of them ranked! Nice work.

[LynnDavidNewton]

Lovely summary, and I happen to agree totally with Op. 111 harder than Hammerklavier because of the second movement, one of the greatest excursions to heaven and back in the history of Western music.

[thelonearchitect]

I'm surprised Op 2/2 is in the painless category. It is considered an off-range piece by many teachers. It doesn't rank against the top tier but is a decent Demanding tier.

[sven-sandershestakov]

A few observations from someone who has performed the entire Hammerklavier on several occasions and studied the op. 111:

1. I don't think you can truly understand the mental difficulty of performing it once you've actually performed it. If you've had a bad day, are a little tired, or have under-prepared even by just a little, disaster can and will start to happen, especially in the fugue.

2. It's not too challenging to give a "decent, listenable" interpretation of it, but an excellent one? That's a different story. The first movement needs to be voiced well and kept under control, the third movement needs razor-sharp focus throughout, else it will start to sound boring about halfway through and the audience will fall asleep. And you will have a memory lapse. If the fugue is just "rattled" through with perfect technique, it will sound pointless. And there are parts of it that are almost unplayable (given, of course, that you play it at a good tempo.)

Of course, I understand that different people find different things difficult or not so difficult, but in my experience, the more I practiced Hammerklavier and the more I got close to giving my first performance, the more difficult it became. Op. 111 made my scratch my head (I was close to giving a performance of it, so I had it almost memorized and pretty fluent after a couple months), but Hammerklavier, after half a year of working on it, made me cry and feel absolutely stupid.

I also had one performance of it which was an absolute, unmitigated disaster. Several memory lapses and full stops - something that has never happened before. I thought I was ready, but apparently, I was underprepared, hadn't slept and so, several parts of the 1st movement and the fugue left my memory as I was sweating like a pig.

This piece requires immense preparation, fingers like lightning, unbreakable concentration and a deep musical understanding to make any sense of the 3rd or 4th movement.

Perhaps sometime in the near future, I will return to it again and try to do it more justice. It's just a massive technical and emotional puzzle that I haven't quite solved yet.

[tonydarcy]

It's nice to know that at least some people, people with greater abilities than my own, can find any Beethoven sonata "painless" !

[Algorox]

This is a fantastic take. Op. 111 is very underrated. I agree with almost all the selections you made in the top 5!

[scarbo]

It is true that op. 106 and op. 111 are in the most difficult category, but there is another that belongs in this group: op. 101. In fact, many pianists, including myself, consider op. 101 the most challenging of them all. It’s just as technically demanding and “risky” as op. 106, but it requires even more sensitivity, and its character is more elusive.

[thewaltzingpiano]

Op. 111 definitely deserves this spot...
Quite a challenging sonata to interpret, with the usual beethovinian grandeur but also a spiritual understanding underlying the entire piece
Nice and well thought-out tier list I would say... +1 Sub

[diegovillacrez]

For a recital I actually played the Waldstein with the Andante Favori as the second movement. It was definitely no joke.

[EduardoRohdeEras]

You convinced me to listening to Beethoven's sonatas again. So beautiful they are

[andy_in_colorado]

I have been working on the Op. 111 Arietta for months. It's far beyond my grasp, but every now and then, I play something and it actually sounds like the music is echoing back at me and it just sends shivers up my spine. Like I'm getting a glimpse of it. I love it.

[beefu]

Waldstein was much more difficult for me than the Appassionata. the third movement in the Waldstein is so much harder to make sound clean than the other. It requires a much more sophisticated pedal and clear voicing

[imdarealani]

Also, if you are a beginner/intermediate pianist, Beethoven also wrote some Sonatinas that are not too difficult, most similar level to the Painless sonatas.

[ujincicero]

To those who thinks op111 is more difficult than op106, I would love to see your video recordings of you playing the entire Hammerklavier on stage or record this piece in 1 take.
Ppl were like:”oh 111 is more difficult in interpretation”
Well, what about the third movement of 106, and what about the following fugal movement that is considered as the hardest passage Beethoven wrote, both in mental and technique way.

The challenge for 111 is the interpretation, the challenge for 106 is try not collapse on the stage XD