This chorale setting by Andrea Aleotti features a stately melody supported by elegant harmonic structures. It is a quintessential example of Renaissance-Baroque transitional polyphony.
At Henle 3 this is a late-beginner piece — comfortable hands-together playing is assumed, and musical shaping starts to matter. The main demands: independent voices that must each sing on their own line; chord voicing — bringing out one note inside a handful of others; and a true singing tone, with the melody floating above the accompaniment.
Focus on balancing the chorale melody against the supportive inner voices to create a singing tone.
Comparable difficulty and character — good candidates for what to learn next.
A level or two down with the same spirit — ideal if this piece is still out of reach.
Where this piece's skills lead: slightly harder works making similar technical demands.
Chorale: Puer natus in Bethlehem is rated Henle level 3 of 9 — late beginner repertoire, roughly ABRSM grades 4–5. In the RCM system it corresponds to about level 5.
You should be comfortable at Henle level 3 — meaning you can already play level 2–3 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 Chorale: Puer natus in Bethlehem lasts about 2 minutes.
Chorale: Puer natus in Bethlehem 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 Chorale: Wenn wir in höchsten Nöten sein by Andrea Aleotti, Campanile by Andrea Aleotti, La fille aux cheveux de lin by Claude Debussy — see the full similar-pieces list on this page.