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.
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.
Each suggestion combines difficulty gap, risk, confidence and skill overlap. The first two cards in each column are the most useful pedagogically.
The safest next step.
A genuine step up, without a jolt.
A useful leap with guided practice.
This set creates an atmosphere of abrupt surprises and rhythmic unpredictability, like a sequence of short sonic bursts and silences where the next attack is never obvious. Technically, the listed challenges are Passages rapides (2.5/5) and Polyrhythmie 2 contre 3 (2.5/5): the fast passages require secure finger articulation and precise releases to preserve clarity of attack, while the 2 against 3 polyrhythm requires independent control of left and right hands to maintain two pulses against three without losing the overall tempo. The work belongs to Cage's piano output as part of his explorations of time and unconventional compositional procedures, in line with his mid‑20th‑century move toward open forms and chance‑based methods.