Piano Sonata g minor Wq 62,18
Sonata Piano solo
In brief

This G minor sonata has a taut, nervous character with sharp contrasts — brusque, incisive gestures alternate with more singing replies, giving a sense of contained urgency rather than broad romantic sweep. Technically you will face Phrasing (2.5/5), which here means shaping short melodic lines through very fine dynamic and timing inflections, and Legato (2.5/5), which requires maintaining voice connection by precise control of touch and finger release in faster passagework; Romantic Ornaments (2.5/5) also appear and call for clear, expressive execution of small cadences and appoggiaturas. The piece belongs to C. P. E. Bach's expressive repertoire, commonly linked with the empfindsamer Stil that bridges baroque practice and classical sensibility. I do not give a recommended recording here because I am not fully confident about a specific reference for this sonata.

MusicCoach difficulty
58/100
Intermediate
Likely range : 51–65/100
Confidence : 58% · fair confidence
BeginnerIntermediateAdvancedVirtuoso
Exam grade
About grade 6 to 7

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.

Does this rating look right to you?

This rating is computed automatically from heterogeneous sources. It gets things wrong, sometimes badly. If you know this work, your answer is worth more than our computation: it tells us which ratings to review.

Add a note (optional)

Your note is not published on the site: it is read in review.

Difficulty sources
Henle Verlag
6
62/100 normalised
Relative difficulty
84%
Among Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach
70%
Era
50%
Genre
Estimated skills
Technique
Legato
1
Ornaments
Romantic ornaments
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