Klavierstück no. 5, "Tombeau"
Piece Piano solo 2 min
In brief

The piece projects a mournful, concentrated mood, made of weighed silences and often dry attacks that read as a meditation on loss rather than overtly lyrical lamentation. Technical challenges include Phrasing (2.5/5): here you must shape very short motifs by clearly differentiating attack and release so that micro-phrases breathe without stretching the line, and Character and style (2.5/5): you are required to sustain a controlled austerity in touch — precise, often detached gestures with fine dynamic control between piano and mezzo. This Klavierstück belongs to the composer's catalogue of solo piano pieces, fitting among his contemporary miniatures and character studies rather than a large-scale cycle. I do not give a recommended recording because I am not certain of a widely recognized reference performance for this specific piece.

MusicCoach difficulty
48/100
Intermediate
Likely range : 36–60/100
Confidence : 32% · to confirm
BeginnerIntermediateAdvancedVirtuoso
Exam grade
About grade 5

Estimated from our difficulty score, not taken from an exam syllabus. Checked against 333 works on the ABRSM syllabus: the exact grade is right 7 times out of 10, and within one grade 99 times out of 100.

Difficulty estimate by MusicCoach on a scale of 1 to 100.

Where this work sits
050100

Most works cluster between 45 and 65: a small score gap often marks a real step. The highlighted bar shows this work among those for the same instrument.

The MusicCoach difficulty measures a work's overall demands (technique, reading, stamina) on a shared 0-100 scale, consolidated from editorial and pedagogical reference points (Henle, exam syllabuses, curation) and our own analyses. It measures neither musical value nor the practice time YOU will need: two musicians of the same level can experience the same work very differently depending on their strengths (hands used to octaves, quick sight-reading…). The confidence reflects how many reference points sit behind the score and how well they agree — a lightly documented score is flagged “to validate”. For a truly personal bearing, the diagnostic and your space compare each work to YOUR estimated level, which the score alone cannot do.

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Relative difficulty
46%
Among Wolfgang Rihm
48%
Era
44%
Genre
Estimated skills
Style
Character and style
1
Interpretation
Phrasing
1
What to play next?

Each suggestion combines difficulty gap, risk, confidence and skill overlap. The first two cards in each column are the most useful pedagogically.

See the whole progression