Kleine Suite, for cello and piano, op. 23, KiV 215
Romantic Suite Cello and Piano
In brief

This Kleine Suite for cello and piano presents an elegant, contrapuntal character, alternating dance-like gestures with more introspective passages where voices are clearly layered. Technically, you will face the “Position du pouce (4.3/5)”, requiring precise thumb shifts to secure smooth position changes and sustain long melodic lines, and “Doubles cordes (violoncelle) (4.3/5)”, which demand careful bow angle and pressure balance to produce an even sound across two strings at once. The piece belongs to Busoni's Romantic-period output and reflects his interest in polyphonic textures and reworking older forms within chamber writing. I do not offer a recommended recording here, as I am not fully certain of a single widely recognized reference performance for this exact work.

Listen to this work

No verified recording for this work yet. We add more every week.

Sheet music

Public-domain sheet music on IMSLP ↗

Is this the right work?
Formation

Cello and piano · 2 performers

Required forces
Cello 1 performers
Piano 1 performers
Playable parts
Cello Piano
MusicCoach difficulty
65/100
Advanced
Likely range : 53–77/100
Confidence : 40% · to confirm
BeginnerIntermediateAdvancedVirtuoso
Exam grade
About grade 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.

Relative difficulty
83%
Among Ferruccio Busoni
63%
Era Romantic
63%
Genre
Estimated skills
Technique
Double stops (cello)
1
Technique
Thumb position
1
Theory
Knowledge of forms
1
Ornaments
Baroque ornaments
1
Style
Baroque style
1
Rhythm
Tempo rubato
1
Style
Romantic style
2
Technique
Position changes (cello)
1
Tone
Touch control
1
Fingering
Complex fingering
1
Technique
Bow legato (cello)
1
Interpretation
Phrasing
2
Tone
Vibrato (cello)
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