Release Date: 12 January 1999
Label: Naxos - Nxc / Naxos Classics
Packaging Type: Jewel Case
No of Units: 1
Barcode: 636943427927
Genres: Classical
Composer/Series: SATIE
Description
Erik Satie (1866-1925)Parade; Gymnopedies;Mercure; Rel?ócheThe French composer Erik Satie earned himself a contemporary reputationas an eccentric. Stravinsky later described him as the oddest person he hadever known and at the same time the most rare and constantly witty. His musicalinnovations proved immensely influential on his nearer contemporaries Debussyand Ravel, and on a younger generation of composers and artists in the yearsafter the war of 1914.Satie was born in 1866 at Honfleur, on the coast of Normandy. His fatherwas at the time a shipping broker, while his mother was of Scottish origin.Something of his later eccentricity seems to have been derived from hispaternal uncle, Adrien Satie, known in Honfleur as a character. The family movedto Paris but on the death of Satie's mother in 1872 he was sent back toHonfleur to the house of his grandparents. Six years later he returned toParis, where, in 1879, he entered the Conservatoire. There he proved anunsatisfactory pupil, lingering on, as a friend alleged, to avoid theobligatory five years of military service, reduced for students to one year,which, in his case, was reduced still further by illness deliberately courted.After his discharge from the infantry, Satie had his first piecespublished by his father, who now had a small publishing business andstationer's shop. In the early 1890s he came under the influence of JosephinPeladan, self-styled S?ór Merodack of the Rose+Croix, breaking with him by 1892.Eclectic medieval preoccupation led him to establish his own mock religion, theMetropolitan Church of the Art of Jesus the Conductor. Of this he fancifullydescribed himself as Parcier et Ma?«tre de Chapelle, the first titlesheer invention, and now published Le cartulaire, a vehicle in which hemight pontifically inveigh against those of whom he disapproved. At the sametime, paradoxically, he was involved with the bohemian cabaret of Rudolf Salisat the Chat Noir. The same years brought contact with Debussy, with whom heremained on good terms, in spite of the latter's tendency to patronise him.In 1905, after a period earning his living as a cafe pianist, Satieenrolled at the Schola Cantorum, where his teachers included Vincent d'Indy andRoussel. Here for three years he tried to remedy his perceived technicaldefects as a composer, particularly by the study of counterpoint. It wasthrough Ravel's performance in 1911 of the Sarabandes of 1887 that theoriginal nature of Satie's genius began to be acknowledged. Still furtherpublic recognition came through his association with Jean Cocteau and hiscollaboration with Dyagilev and others. In the years after the war, thanks toCocteau, he became the centre of attention of a group of young composers, LesSix, originally known as Les nouveaux jeunes and then, in 1923, onthe prompting of Darius Milhaud, of a group that took the name l'Ecoled'Arcueil, called after the relatively remote district of Paris where Satiechose to live in stark simplicity. Here his roo
Tracklisting
Dariia Lytvishko
Baltimore Symphony Orchestra; Marin Alsop
Alice Di Piazza; Basel Sinfonietta; NDR Bigband; Titus Engel
Anna Alas i Jove; Miquel Villalba
David Childs; Black Dyke Band; Nicholas Childs
Zenz:Cathariou:Iacovidou
Zahir Ensemble
Yun-Yi Qin
