Satie - Orchestral Works (Toulouse Capitole Orchestra, 1988)

Couple of recent charity shop finds this week.  First up, here's a really enjoyable hour of the orchestral side of Erik Satie, which I could certainly do with exploring further.  Plasson and the Toulouse Capitole give this music all the subtlety, wit and charm it requires in a beautifully detailed recording from 1988.

A definite highlight of this collection is Satie's music for Parade, a surreal one-act ballet devised by Jean Cocteau, choreographed by Leonide Massine and with bizarre cubist costumes by Picasso.  Lasting only 15 minutes, the score includes the sounds of typewriters and foghorns - allegedly at Cocteau's insistence over Satie's distaste, but in hindsight sounding like an influence on Varèse, who was acquainted with Satie around this time.  Moving from surrealism to Dada, Francis Picabia's ballet Relâche ("Cancelled") sparkles with Satie's lush, expressive and witty score.

Elsewhere, Satie's sense of playfulness and influences from Fin De Siècle cabaret make the dance suite La Belle Excentrique an uproarious joy, and the Varèse-commissioned Cinq Grimaces occupies a similar space.  There's also opportunity on this album to just luxuriate in the sublime compositional genius of Satie in arrangements of works originally for piano (or written in both piano and orchestral forms).  Gymnnopodies No. 1 & 3 are here in orchestrations by Debussy, Gnossienne No. 3 by Poulenc, and Satie's own settings of La Piccadilly and En Habit De Cheval.  A hugely recommended collection.

 

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Erik Satie at SGTG:

Piano Works

Gnossiennes/Ogives

Messe Des Pauvres