Canon in F minor
Piano solo
In brief

This Canon in F minor has the feeling of a close, tense dialogue—two voices answering each other with repeated figures that build subtle tension rather than loud drama. Technically, you will need to focus on Indépendance des mains (2.5/5) to keep a steady accompanying line in the left hand while allowing the right hand melody to breathe, and on Polyphonie à deux voix (2.5/5) when extracting two simultaneous lines within the same hand, which requires articulation through careful fingerings, substitutions and control of touch for clear legato and separation. The piece is listed as a Chopin solo piano work with an uncertain period of composition, so it sits somewhat outside the core numbered catalogue and offers useful insight into his contrapuntal writing. I do not suggest a reference performance because I do not have a reliably identifiable source for this specific piece.

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Is this the right work?
MusicCoach difficulty
42/100
Elementary
Likely range : 30–54/100
Confidence : 38% · to confirm
BeginnerIntermediateAdvancedVirtuoso
Exam grade
About grade 4 to 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
10%
Among Frédéric Chopin
37%
Era
Genre
Estimated skills
Theory
Harmonic analysis
1
Style
Character and style
1
Technique
Hand independence
1
Technique
Two-voice polyphony
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.

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