6.6.2011 - Satie (repeat)

[Mandryka]

It is an extraordinary thing. Presumably this is the side of Satie that Cage was thinking about when he wrote that form is defined by means of time lengths. I just find it unbelievable that the piece was written in 1892!

[Serial_Apologist]

It is an extraordinary thing. Presumably this is the side of Satie that Cage was thinking about when he wrote that form is defined by means of time lengths. I just find it unbelievable that the piece was written in 1892!

Yes but there were precedents! I'm sure Satie would have been aware of songs composed about 20 years earlier by Mussorgsky which made use of pretty remote chord changes,

[Bryn]

From the programme notes to the Duanduan Hao CD with (Naxos) on it:

Uspud, was not originally intended for piano.
Conceived as a Christian ballet/shadow play in three acts
by J.P. Contamine de Latour, Satie’s music required flutes,
harps, and strings. Although it was composed in 1892, it
was not premiered until almost a century later, on 9 May
1979 at the Opéra-Comique.3 Satie’s bitterness that it was
not performed at its intended location was expressed on
the title page of the score: ‘présenté au théâtre national de
l’Opéra de 20 décembre 1892’ – ‘presented to’ but not
‘performed at’. The play bears a striking resemblance to
Rivière’s La Tentation de saint Antoine, which Satie
witnessed some five years previously. As one might expect,
De Latour and Satie take the hermetic theme to the point of
absurdity, resulting in a mock-serious spiritual exercise,
provoking both enthusiastic appreciation and strong
criticism when Satie played it through on the piano one
evening to a group of acquaintances at the Auberge du
Clou. Uspud is the sole character, while everyone and
everything else – from saints and angels to demons and
humans with animals heads – appear as figments of his
feverish, fantastic imagination. The music was probably
intended not to be continuous, but rather to highlight
particular features of the tableaux and commentary.

[Mandryka]

Loved it since first hearing it in the Riri Shimada triple CD set.

I like this more than Nicolas Hovarth’s recording, which is the one I was listening to before. Thanks for mentioning it.

[Mandryka]

Yes but there were precedents! I'm sure Satie would have been aware of songs composed about 20 years earlier by Mussorgsky which made use of pretty remote chord changes,

Some suggestions as to what to listen to would be appreciated. It’s about 15 years ago since I last heard Songs and Dances of Death, a concert with Thomas Quasthoff I remember. Is that what you’re thinking of?

[Serial_Apologist]

Some suggestions as to what to listen to would be appreciated. It’s about 15 years ago since I last heard Songs and Dances of Death, a concert with Thomas Quasthoff I remember. Is that what you’re thinking of?

It is.