Biography of Musician Eric Satie
Avant Garde French Composer, Occult Founder, and 'Les Six' Mentor
Mar 6, 2008
French composer Eric Satie is mostly famous for his piano pieces such as Trois Gymnopedies (Three ‘Naked Feet’, 1888) for piano and Trois embyons desseches (Three Dried-Up Embryos, 1913.) He was mentor to the prominent group of young French composers called "Les Six."
Living a highly unconventional life, eccentric and a recluse, his way of life is echoed in his sad and comic works. Yet his music is never dull. His aesthetic of ironic simplicity, as in the Messe des pauvres (Poor People’s Mass), acted as a nationalist antidote to the perceived excesses of German Romanticism.
His Early Life
Eric (Alfred Leslie) Satie (17 May 1866 – 1 July 1925) was born in Honfleur, Normandy, a French composer of Scottish descent, with a French father and Scottish mother.
Aged 13, he moved to Paris and studied at the Conservatory and came into contact with intellectual circles through his friendship with the impressionist composer Claude Debussy. Previous to this he lived precariously by playing piano at cafes and cabarets.
The Religious Cult Founder
After composing Gymnopedies, he joined a religious-occult sect, later founding an order of his own, himself as high priest. His wry sense of humour were often revealed in bizarre titles of his works including Trois morceaux en forme de poire (Three Pieces in a Shape of a Pear, 1903), The Dreamy Fish, and Trois embryons desseches (Three dried-up embryos).
The Composer in Prominent French Circles
In 1915 he started composing music for ballet Parade, commissioned from Diaghilev, in collaboration with Pablo Picasso and Jean Cocteau. At the same time he mentored the “Les Six” group of six young French composers, who, under his influence and Cocteau had achieved notoriety through their advanced ideas) and promoted the concept of musique d’ameublement (furniture music), anticipating the impact of radio. His Parade also radically included background sounds of typewriter and sirens, and invented a new style of film music, for Rene Clair’s Entr’acte (Interval, 1924).
Later Compositions
His later works, between 1918 until 1924, included Socrate for voices and instruments, two operettas, and two ballets, Mercure and Relache. He died from cirrhosis of the liver, after years of heavy drinking. Despite his radical ideas in musical content and style, Satie’s creative innovations had a great influence in musical history.
List of Satie's Major Works
- Trois gymnopedies for piano, 1888
- Trois gnossiennes for piano, 1890
- Danses gothiques for piano, 1893
- Messe des pouvres, a Latin Mass with psalms for voices and organ/piano, 1895
- Jack-in-the-box, ballet, 1899
- Trois morceaux en forme de poire, 1903
- The Dreamy Fish, 1905
- Trois embryons desseches (Three Dried-up Embryos), 1913
- Parade, ballet, 1917
- Socrate for voices and instruments, 1918
- Trois petites pieces montees, 1920
- Musique d'amueblement (Furniture Music), 1920
- Mercure, ballet, 1924
- Relache, ballet, 1924
Sources:
Dictionary of the Arts, Gramercy Books (1999)
The Grove Concise Dictionary of Music, edited by Stanley Sadie, Macmillan (1994)
The Oxford Companion to Music, edited by Alison Latham (2002)
