Written in 1918, this work is extremely challenging technically for the piano. From 1912 to 1914, Bartók, who had most vigorously pursued folk music research trips in his life, had somewhat suppressed his activities as a composer. However, after undertaking arrangements of Romanian folk music, exemplified by the Sonatina, in 1915, he successively released a series of characteristic works from 1916 to 1922. These Three Etudes are one such work in this series, revealing both tradition and innovation in Bartók's piano compositions.

Bartók during this period is often said to have been influenced by his contemporary Viennese composer, Schoenberg. While there is no historical evidence confirming direct contact between the two, it is true that Schoenberg began writing works that fundamentally abandoned tonality in the 1910s, and Bartók began composing avant-garde sounding pieces that dispensed with key signatures in the latter half of the 1910s, a temporal coincidence. Indeed, following his approach to serial techniques in the Piano Suite, Sz. 62, written slightly earlier in 1916, Bartók also extensively uses chromatic sonorities that avoid tonality in these Three Etudes. On the other hand, the approach of creating works within the etude genre that are substantial enough for concert repertoire was inherited from 19th-century pianist-composers such as Chopin and Liszt. Therefore, it would be more appropriate to view these etudes as inheriting the practices of various earlier or contemporary composers rather than being influenced by a specific composer.

The three pieces collectively adopt a fast-slow-fast structure.

Etude No. 1 (Allegro molto)

In Etude No. 1 (Allegro molto), dissonant chord leaps intensify a wild impression within layers of sound where chromatic pitches are arranged with varying registers, yet the piece itself adopts a condensed ternary form with a shortened recapitulation.

Etude No. 2 (Andante sostenuto)

Etude No. 2 (Andante sostenuto) serves as a slow movement, and, apart from the climactic chordal superimposition, features a clear separation between a long-breathed melody and virtuosic accompaniment.

Etude No. 3 (Rubato – Tempo giusto capriccioso)

Etude No. 3 (Rubato – Tempo giusto capriccioso) is written in a ternary form (A-B-A') with an introduction, making its form the most easily graspable among the three pieces. While a clear melodic line appears in the middle section, the A and A' sections feature sixteenth notes in the left hand moving erratically across a wide range, and chords in the right hand appearing at irregular intervals, creating a tension that disrupts the sense of meter.