The aim of this rather challenging disc, according to pianist Claire Chevallier in her erudite, thoughtful, and yet entertaining booklet notes, is to demonstrate "the existence of a continuous line of thought in Satie's life." The line of thought under discussion is Satie's unorthodox spirituality, which was by all accounts closely linked to his music, and which took various forms during the first part of his career. The music on the program is all drawn from that time period, although it is not chronologically organized; ...
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The aim of this rather challenging disc, according to pianist Claire Chevallier in her erudite, thoughtful, and yet entertaining booklet notes, is to demonstrate "the existence of a continuous line of thought in Satie's life." The line of thought under discussion is Satie's unorthodox spirituality, which was by all accounts closely linked to his music, and which took various forms during the first part of his career. The music on the program is all drawn from that time period, although it is not chronologically organized; the program ends with the very early Ogives (1886). Satie flirted with Rosicrucianism (in a distinctive Parisian sect also attractive to Debussy) but loved to visit Notre-Dame. Later he founded a single-member church of his own, which he called the "Eglise Métropolitaine d'Art et de Jésus Conducteur." The musical counterparts to these ideas were stark harmonies and modal tunes derived from Satie's studies of chant and medieval music. Chevallier takes these pieces as a group and...
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