Meyer-Olbersleben’s Ballade is a heavy, emotionally saturated work that draws heavily from the German Romantic tradition. Its dark, brooding character and frequent use of powerful chord clusters make it an intense, if rarely performed, concert piece.
Maintaining control over the dense, heavy chordal passages without sacrificing musical flow is the key technical task.
Comparable difficulty and character — good candidates for what to learn next.
Ballade (Op.9) is rated Henle level 6 of 9 — advanced repertoire, roughly ABRSM grades 7–8. In the RCM system it corresponds to about level 8.
You should be comfortable at Henle level 6 — meaning you can already play level 5–6 pieces cleanly. Learning it one level early is possible as a stretch piece, but more than that usually leads to months of frustration.
A typical performance of Ballade (Op.9) lasts about 7 minutes.
Ballade (Op.9) is available as free public-domain sheet music on IMSLP — the score is linked directly from this page.
Pieces at a comparable difficulty and character include 'Ch'io mi scordi di te?' by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Ballade by Edvard Grieg, Balada mexicana by Manuel Ponce — see the full similar-pieces list on this page.