Most Difficult Piano Piece

Moonlight Sonata is usually a challenging piece that's pretty fast, and sounds awesome.

Rachmaninoff's 3rd is often considered one of the most difficult.

Did you try Googling it? There are lots of hits for "difficult piano piece."
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080420055904AALAZ4L
http://forums.abrsm.org/index.php?showtopic=6557
http://www.pianoworld.com/ubb/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=18;...
http://www.8notes.com/f/36_104820.asp

I think the thing you're talking about is a glissando, though it's not always the entire keyboard.

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You could also consider piano works by Scriabin or Prokofiev. They can be fast and tricky to play, they're not very musically intuitive (you can't guess by ear what would come next if you get lost), and perhaps more importantly, they *sound* hard to the listener!

Braham's Rhapsody in Gmin has been giving me fits for years now.

Moonlight Sonata isn't a "fast" piece, and relatively easy compared with the Braham's piece.

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Moonlight Sonata is not considered at all difficult. In fact, I have taught it to students who have studied for two or three years.

Some difficult ones: Rachmaninoff's No. 2 and No. 3 are considered quite difficult, Prokofiev's No. 2, Beethoven's Pathetique is very emotive and impressive, but not actually that hard. American in Paris by Gershwin is actually quite challenging, and very fun to listen to.

Lizst's Hungarian Rhapsody is considered quite difficult, but it's for two pianos, so yeah.

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I hear the accompaniment to Schubert's Erlkonig is quite difficult, but it's for voice and piano. Anything by a romantic-era or contemporary composer (excluding Satie), especially Arnold Schoenberg, would be good. Schoenberg writes in serialism, which is as much random notes as anything else. A music professor of mine studied composition with a teacher who had learned from a composer who studied serialism, and the one piece of his she liked in the entire course was the one that he wrote as a joke, and was completely random notes everywhere. She called it his best work. Believe me - it sounds awful.

I heard one pianist say that playing a typical piano concerto takes about as much effort as shoveling a ton of coal. But, he said, playing the Rach Three is like shoveling three tons of coal. It's not unusual to break piano strings with this piece.

Debussy's piece "golliwog's cakewalk" was a pain for me. It came with a pamplet of directions for how to break it down to learn it because it was so tricky!

Stuff by Bach is usually pretty hard, for me at least. Damn baroque! I agree about Moonlight Sonata being hard. The actual notes aren't hard but it is difficult to get all the little technical bits and pieces to make it sound great, and it sounds impressive when played.

I don't have a lot of experience here, but what about "Flight of the Bumblebee"? It's not complex, but it is insanely fast. Though it's already been associated with prodigy pianists, thanks to... er... that four-year-old pianist girl. I forget her name now.

But yeah, it's quite difficult to play.

There's also Chopin's Fantaisie Impromptu.

I haven't tried to play it, but I would imagine that John Field's pastorals are pretty difficult. But I haven't been playing piano long, so I might be mistaken.

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This will sound dumb, but the ones I find hardest for me are ragtime pieces, even ones that really aren't that hard. One piece that a lot of people like is Jon Schmidt's Waterfall. My twin brother's, who don't really play the piano, each spent an inexorbitant amount of time learning it, because they liked it so much. Only neither one was talented enough to do the whole thing, so one learned the top hand and one the bottom hand and they sit side by side at the piano and play it together. It sounds at least somewhat difficult, though you wouldn't really need to be a concert pianist to play it. Waterfall grates on my nerves, though. My vote is for Pathetique. Awesome piece. But, if your character is autistic (did you say he was autistic?) you might stick to Baroque. Not helpful at all, I know. But hey, I'm procrastinating.

Chopin's etudes are hell! At least, I think so. I've never managed without making at least a dozen mistakes and I've been practicing over half a year now T_T

The Rach 3 and Flight of the Bumblebee are definitely utterly impressive- but I'd stay away from them unless you want people thinking 'hang on, didn't the guy in 'Shine' play them?'. Haha. Rach's 2nd Concerto is actually possibly one of my favourite 'classical' works in all the world, and definitely no easy feat to pull off! I encourage anyone to track it down and have a listen, it makes me swoon every time.

Fantasie Impromptu, haha. That was my old teacher's favourite 'party piece', she'd whip it out anywhere that asked for the crowd to be wowed. A good one to pull oohs and aahs, for sure.

Almost anything by Rachmaninoff is going to drive a pianist batty. I have a friend (professional pianist) who would spend an hour learning one measure, and that was just perfectly notes and rhythms! However, Rachmaninoff also has the benefit of being freaking WONDERFUL to listen to. Impresses the ladies. Mwahaha...

Also, I am a fan of Chopin's Revolutionary Etude. Also pretty difficult. Just some ideas...

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The piano section of Rhapsody in Blue by Gershwin. My dad took six months nailing it down. :P

Flight of the Bumblebee scares me. It scares me a lot. But I WILL learn to play it one day.

Dance Macabre isn't very nice looking or easy from my experience but I'm still kind of new at this (I can play intermediate songs but it takes me a little while to get it).

Moonlight Sonata isn't very hard. In fact I'm going to start working on playing it after Christmas.

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Flight of the Bumblebee, by Rimsky Korsakov is insanely fast
Revolutionary Etude by Chopin, also insanely fast.
You might want to just pick some random things by Liszt, because he rewrote lots of stuff into hard piano arrangements

BTW to the poster above, Danse Macabre's really not that hard. It looks intimidating, but there's nothing terribly complicated about it. =) Lovely piece.

Chopin's 24 preludes range from hard to rediculously difficult, and the big one I'm working on now - Bartok's 15 Hungarian Peasant Songs is pretty difficult - and one of the coolest pieces of music I've heard.

Whatever you choose, emphasize how quickly it took your character to learn the piece - it usually takes months to years to really learn a piece well.

I think, when you ask about what it's called when someone plays each key from one side of the keyboard to the other, you're referring to a glissando. You don't actually play the black notes with a glissando; you just slide your finger (usually thumb) across all the white ones. I hated pieces with those, because they always ripped my nails and made my thumbs bleed. Here's what it says at http://www.music.vt.edu/musicdictionary/: Glissando: A rapid ascending or descending of the scale. If a glissando is performed on a piano or harp, not every semitone is played, because the finger is drawn across only the white keys in the case of the piano.

La Campanella would be a very impressive piece. It's a Franz Liszt piece adapted from a melody by Niccolo Paganini, I think. A lot of fun to listen to.

Liszt and Rachmaninoff are both difficult, because they had monstrous big hands and composed for themselves. Pianists with smaller hands often just can't reach all the doggone keys, and have to adapt.

Chopin can also be difficult, because not only do you have to be a technical virtuoso, but his work is all about passion. A mechanical, flawless performance of his work is flat and dull, and not worth listening to. For that reason, a work that might not be technically so difficult, but emotionally difficult and revealing, might also be a good choice.

If you like works with lots of glissando, Chopin's Etudes are good bets. Etude in C minor, "Revolutionary", Etude in G Flat Major "Black Key", A Minor "Winter Wind" are good examples.

Okay - finally something I actually know about (not that it ever stops me when I don't).

DMA in piano here, so pretty familiar with the rep. When people say Rachmaninoff 2nd, 3rd, etc. they mean concerto. So unless you're going to have an orchestra involved, you don't want those. Also - the Rach 3rd was already prominently featured in the movie Shine. If you are going to use concertos, you might consider the Prokoviev 3rd

Goliwog's Cakewalk is in the Childrens' coreer - so not difficult. Moonslight sonate (i.e. Op. 27, no. 2) - the famous part is the first movement - quite slow and not at all difficult. Last movement - fast - still not terribly difficult.

SO, here are my suggestions:

Gaspard de la Nuit - - - Ravel., particularly the last movement Scarbo This is generally regarded as the most difficult piece for solo piano.
Islamey - - - Balakirev. This was generally regarded as the most difficult piece before the Ravel.

Other ones that rank right up there.
Prokofiev- - - Sonata No. 7 also Tocatta
Schuman - - - - Fantasy - - particularly the second movment - - devilish blind leaps near the end also Tocatta, various parts of Carnaval
Lizt - - - - Sonata in B minor, La Campanella and various other pieces could work as well

Others that are still pretty hairy

Beethoven - - Sonata opus 106 - 'Hammerklavier; Opus 57 'Appassionata, Opus 53 'Waldstein'
Horowitz - - - his trascription / on various pieces - - i.e. Variations on a themes from Bizet's Carmen, his version of the Liszt Hungarian Rhapsodies, 2 and 6
Chopin - - - any number of etudes are pretty difficult - and they mostly sound like it. these are good if you need something short. Also, the G minor Ballade, or F minor Ballade. Most any of the Scherzos.
There are also some Scriabin etudes and sonatas that are quite difficult, nott to mention messien, etc.
Debussy - - - l'isly Joyeuse - pretty difficult and quite flashy - especially the end. some of the Images
Aaron Copland variations - - these are pretty hairy and very dissonant
Schubert - - - not much extreme difficulty, other than possibly the Wanderer Fantasy.
Mozart - - sorry not too flashy there. Ditto for Haydn (at least not compared w/ later composers)
Mendelssohn - - nothing springs to mind.
Brahms - - - Great composer, and difficult, but not necessarily showy or flashy.
Bach - - - virtuosic, but harpsichord technique was so different - not that flashy by modern standards.

So - there is a lot to choose from. You might ask yourself a few questions, such as
- How long should it be. Some of the pieces above are 30 minutes long.
- What kind of feel do you want it have - tragic? heroic? demonic?
- Does it need to be familiar to the average person, or just difficult?

Alrighty - I'm sure I forgot some good ones. PM me if you want specific more suggestions.

I would say not to use Chopin or pieces that require emotion. The kid's autistic, right? So anyway.

Yeah ... about that. I don't know what I'm talking about, but, the suggestions here -- Liszt, Rachmaninoff, Prokofiev -- have been good. xD

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Turkish Ronda by Mozart is another difficult piece.

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Wow...thanks everyone! I'm going to copy and paste this page. My pianist is autistic, but as I thought about this, I DO want to include pieces that require emotion. This is a sort of time travel thing and I'll have him unable to play as a slave in the 1800's but then when he finds love in modern times, the emotion will be there. I know that explanation doesn't make much sense, but I know you don't want to read a book here...LOL.

Anyway- thank you so much! ~L

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Thank you very much! They are playing piano in my novel also so thanks for all tips about piano pieces.