The French composer Erik Satie, creator of an openly satirical if somewhat modest art according to some, left the Paris conservatory in 1886 after seven years of study without winning any awards. Indeed, a professor described him as a "talented but indolent student". However, two years later he composed his famous Gymnopedies, and the following year, the equally celebrated Gnossiennes. They are short piano pieces evoking a singular atmosphere through stylistic resources of surprising simplicity, although with an original harmonic treatment that caught the attention of his friend Debussy, whom he had met in a Parisian cabaret.
Pianist at the Le Chat Noir
Yes, because after leaving the conservatory, the young Satie decided to make a living as a cabaret pianist. At the age of 21, he started working at the Le Chat Noir cabaret, playing popular melodies and accompanying the singing of enthusiastic patrons, some of them famous or on their way to becoming so, such as Maupassant or Verlaine. But his temper worked against him and soon after he had to leave Le Chat Noir in an inelegant way.
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| Erik Satie, in 1898 (1866 - 1925) |
But he soon got a job in another cabaret, L'auberge du clou. There he stayed for several years and had the good fortune to meet Claude Debussy, four years his senior and already a musician of some renown. Debussy applauded the harmonies of this irreverent young man (and learned from them, so the story goes) but a few years later he will complain about Satie's carelessness in his treatment of musical forms.
"Trois morceaux en forme de poir"
Erik did not forget the suggestion and in 1903 he compiled pieces composed from 1890 until that year, to which he added a couple of recently created pages to form a suite for four-hand piano that he entitled Trois morceaux en forme de poir (Three Pieces in the Form of a Pear). Very much in line with his irreverence, the pieces are not three nor are they pear-shaped. It was one of his first delusional titles. Dissected embryos, from 1913, Things seen to the right and left (without glasses) from 1914, and Bureaucratic Sonatina, from 1917, to name a few, will come.
The rendition (audio only) is by the French pianist Robert Casadesus and his wife, Gaby. The paintings are by Paul Cezanne.
The work (which I recommend listening to with headphones) is made up of the following seven pieces:
00:00 Manière de commencement
03:07 Prolongement du même
03:59 Morceaux I Lentement
05:20 Morceaux II Enlève
07:49 Morceaux III Brutal
10:28 En plus
12:22 Redite
