# Satie



## JackRance (Sep 13, 2021)

I don't like his music and i feel totally indifferent. Does someone like him and can explain me why?


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## SanAntone (May 10, 2020)

JackRance said:


> I don't like his music and i feel totally indifferent. Does someone like him and can explain me why?


I like him; because I like his wit, and of course the sound of his music.


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## Rogerx (Apr 27, 2018)

JackRance said:


> I don't like his music and i feel totally indifferent. Does someone like him and can explain me why?


This is just to help:

https://www.talkclassical.com/23775-erik-satie-6.html?highlight=satie


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

JackRance said:


> I don't like his music and i feel totally indifferent. Does someone like him and can explain me why?


There are two Satie styles. Have you heard both?


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## larold (Jul 20, 2017)

You say you don't like his music and are totally indifferent. Which is it?


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## JackRance (Sep 13, 2021)

Mandryka said:


> There are two Satie styles. Have you heard both?


nope, can you help me?


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

JackRance said:


> nope, can you help me?


Yes, I think so. Here's an example of his early style






And here's an example of his later style


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## SanAntone (May 10, 2020)

_Socrate_ by *Erik Satie* is something not solo piano which I think is one of his best works. Originally scored for a chamber ensemble, here it is with piano.voice.






No. 1. Portrait de Socrate - Barbara Hannigan, Reinbert de Leeuw


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## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

Satie had several styles. He began with a plainsong/medieval phase with the Rosecrucians (Les Files des Etoiles). His Gymnopedies and Sarabandes come from that period.

When his friend and fellow experimenter Claude Debussy got famous, Satie changed his style to something like Cubism, where he would insert everyday tunes into his pieces like the Cubists did with Le Journal. This is where he shows his sense of humor. He gave them eccentric titles like Dessicated Embryos, which actually did describe the pieces, and inserted expressions like play the piece "like a nightingale with a toothache." He even collaborated with Picasso in a ballet called Parade, which included sirens and other noisemakers. Also notable in this time is Sports et Divertissements, where the left page has a drawing and the right page has a short piece about the drawing with a running commentary underneath. He also wrote some interesting and quirky art songs.

He had a period which anticipated the Dada movement, like Le Piege de Meduse. 

He ended by anticipating Neoclassicism with what has been called white music with pieces like Socrate and the Nocturnes, where he presents the music as it is, without the dramatics. 

He also wrote the first frame-by-frame film music (Relache) and anticipated Muzak with his Furniture Music. 

He also wrote pop songs, like Je Te Veux (featured in a recent cat food commercial). He inserted a nice ragtime piece in Parade. 

It seems like if you don't like one phase of Satie, there is always another one.


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## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

I wrote this in 2016 on TC about the Gymnopedies:

As far as Satie, the wonderful thing about the Gymnopedies is, they feel timeless; they are so simple but also subtle. They don't really go anywhere; they just are. The background chords are static in rhythm but not in sound, varying from triads to seventh and ninth chords. The melody is just one line, like a Greek vase has a static background with the figures drawn over it. But the line is so simple, with phrase lengths expanding and contracting, that it could go on forever. Satie's genius is reflected by Ned Rorem, who said that Satie knew when to stop. Alan Gilmore writes, "Since strong contrast is deliberately suppressed, the tiniest deviations become meaningful." The three pieces can be considered cubist, because they take a single idea and present it from three different perspectives, as if it were one piece written three times.

So to me, they are attractive because of their amazing economy of means.


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## BrahmsWasAGreatMelodist (Jan 13, 2019)

Not a composer I typically resonate with, but today - listening to many of his works - it just, sort of, _clicked_...


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

Love his Gymnopedies. Some of the most moody pieces every made. Cage and others also saw Satie as some sort of Zen guru


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

Phil loves classical said:


> Cage and others also saw Satie as some sort of Zen guru


I don't think so!


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

Mandryka said:


> I don't think so!


Care to explain? Or just how you feel?


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## mbhaub (Dec 2, 2016)

When I need something just totally off-the-wall, fun, witty and inane, I pull out "Parade". He beat Leroy Anderson to scoring for typewriter by 40 years. Add in the foghorn, pistol and other sound effects - it's a hoot! Try it.


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## joen_cph (Jan 17, 2010)

De Leeuw's recordings of the piano works, such as the Gnoissiennes, are unique in their meditative style and might convert you. They're probably apart from the Satie of his own days, but you could say that they render 'a truth that can be found in the scores also'.


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

Manxfeeder said:


> Satie had several styles. He began with a plainsong/medieval phase with the Rosecrucians (Les Files des Etoiles). His Gymnopedies and Sarabandes come from that period.
> 
> When his friend and fellow experimenter Claude Debussy got famous, Satie changed his style to something like Cubism, where he would insert everyday tunes into his pieces like the Cubists did with Le Journal. This is where he shows his sense of humor. He gave them eccentric titles like Dessicated Embryos, which actually did describe the pieces, and inserted expressions like play the piece "like a nightingale with a toothache." He even collaborated with Picasso in a ballet called Parade, which included sirens and other noisemakers. Also notable in this time is Sports et Divertissements, where the left page has a drawing and the right page has a short piece about the drawing with a running commentary underneath. He also wrote some interesting and quirky art songs.
> 
> ...


Really helpful post, it has prompted me to explore some byways I've ignored. Listening to the Satie/Cage Furniture Music Etcetera as I type this. I didn't know it existed.


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## Nawdry (Dec 27, 2020)

Manxfeeder said:


> As far as Satie, the wonderful thing about the Gymnopedies is, they feel timeless; they are so simple but also subtle. They don't really go anywhere; they just are. The background chords are static in rhythm but not in sound, varying from triads to seventh and ninth chords. The melody is just one line, like a Greek vase has a static background with the figures drawn over it. But the line is so simple, with phrase lengths expanding and contracting, that it could go on forever. Satie's genius is reflected by Ned Rorem, who said that Satie knew when to stop. Alan Gilmore writes, "Since strong contrast is deliberately suppressed, the tiniest deviations become meaningful." The three pieces can be considered cubist, because they take a single idea and present it from three different perspectives, as if it were one piece written three times.


Perhaps the most powerful and magical characteristic of certain great works of classical music is that they can transport our consciousness out of our normal life and world and immerse us briefly in the edge of a dimension of pure beauty. Satie's _Gymnopedies_ are examples of music like that.


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## Holden4th (Jul 14, 2017)

I fell in love with Satie's music on first hearing. It was a compilation CD covering most periods of his life. I'd never heard of the pianist before (Angela Brownridge) but just loved what she did with Satie.


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