Search - Erik Satie :: Peter Fletcher Plays Erik Satie

The Distilled Simplicity of Erik Satie Realized by Peter Fle

Grady Harp | Los Angeles, CA United States | 01/21/2006

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Erik Satie (1865 - 1925) remains an enigma to the classical music world. His compositions are so apparently transparent and minimalist that he simply defied classification for years. Highly regarded among the brilliant minds of his time, composers such as Debussy, Ravel, Stravinsky, Milhaud, his purity of impulse of creation, reducing the excesses of Romanticism to what would open the way toward modern music, is still a point of revelation.



Peter Fletcher is not only a brilliant musician, but he is also a musicologist whose absorption in the music that he elects to perform demonstrates sensitivity to the composer's impulses that allows him to enter the difficult world of transcription. This generous recording of the music of Erik Satie includes works that are indeed standard repertoire (the 'Gymnopedies' and 'Gnossiennes' are often performed by pianists and by orchestras in the famous transcriptions by Debussy, as well as the rarely heard works such as 'Sports et Divertissements' that Fletcher performs impeccably along with the French poetry beautifully recited by an uncredited female reader ('Tiny Thoughts for Children'). And after an array of jewels Fletcher ends this recital with the lovely waltz 'Je te veux'. Ah, Paris!



The recorded sound is warm in presence with excellent engineering. But in the end it is Fletcher's suave tone and quiet surface (no fingers on strings sounds here!) that allows us to simply listen to the gentle genius of Satie's melodies. No higher praise could be paid a performer. Highly recommended,

Grady Harp, January 06"

A broad range of gems from a very influential and intersting

Craig Matteson | Ann Arbor, MI | 01/10/2006

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This is a disk of very charming and witty music played masterfully in very fine transcriptions for guitar. Peter Fletcher is a musician of great sensitivity and a master of his instrument. Somehow, he makes all of these pieces come across wonderfully well. The parts are all cleanly heard and their fun, wit, and even mystical aspects are all communicated.



The notes provided are very helpful. The listener can get the background of all the pieces as well as the English translation of the narrated portions of the large work on the disk, "Sports et Divertissements" from 1914. You will get to hear the familiar Satie (The "Three Gymnopédies" from 1888, the sad Rag-Time from Parade (commemorating the sinking of the Titanic) from 1919, to several quite unfamiliar and delightful gems.



However, I believe that, more than for most other composers of significance, it is quite helpful to get some idea of the character and personality of Erik Satie in order to come to terms with his music.



Sorry for the long quote to follow, but it is insightful. In "Conversations with Igor Stravinsky" when asked what he recalled of Satie, the composer said, "He was certainly the oddest person I have ever known, but the most rare and consistently witty person, too. I had a great liking for him and he appreciated my friendliness, I think, and liked me in return. With his pince-nez, umbrella, and galoshes he looked a perfect schoolmaster, but he looked just as much like one without these accoutrements. He spoke very softly, hardly opening his mouth, but he delivered each word in an inimitable, precise way. His handwriting recalls his speech to me: it is exact, drawn. His manuscripts were like him also, which is to say as the French say `fin'. No one ever saw him wash - he had a horror of soap. Instead he was forever rubbing his fingers with pumice. He was always very poor, poor by conviction, I think. He lived in a poor section and his neighbours seemed to appreciate his coming among them: he was greatly respected by them. His apartment was also very poor. It did not have a bed but only a hammock. In winter Satie would fill bottles with hot water and put them flat in a row underneath his hammock. It looked like some strange kind of marimba. I remember once when someone had promised him some money he replied: `Monsier, what you have said did not fall on a deaf ear.'



"His sarcasm depended on French classic usages. The first time I heard `Socrate', at a séance where he played it for a few of us, he turned around at the end and said in perfect bourgeoisie: `Voila, messiers, dames.'



"I met him in 1913, I believe, at any rate I photographed him with Debussy in that year. Debussy introduced him to me and Debussy `protected' and remained a good friend to him. In those early years he played many of his compositions for me at the paino (I don't think he knew much about instruments and I prefer `Socrate' as he played it to the clumsy orchestra score.) I always thought him literarily limited. The titles are literary, and whereas Klee's titles are literary they do not limit the painting; Satie's do, I think, and they are very much less amusing the second time. But the trouble with `Socrate' is that it is metrically boring. Who can stand that much regularity? All the same, the music of Scorates' death is touching and dignifying in a unique way. Satie's own sudden and mysterious death - shortly after `Socrate' [this is odd because the piece was premiered in 1918 and Satie died in 1925 - CSM] - touched me too. He had been turned towards religion near the end of his life and he started going to Communion. I saw him after church one morning and he said in that extraordinary manner of his: `Alors, j'ai un peu communiqué ce matin.' He became ill very suddenly and died quickly and quietly."



Slonimsky, in the third edition of "Baker's Biographical Dictionary of Musicians" says, in part, of Satie: "celebrated French composer who elevated his eccentricities and verbal virtuosity to the plane of high art."



Again, this is the kind of disk you should get and enjoy for so many reasons not the least of which is the fun of hearing these pieces in a new way because they are performed on guitar."

Unique transcriptions for guitar

Redgecko | USA | 08/06/2008

(3 out of 5 stars)

"Not only are some of the transcriptions unique but they are beautifully played, at least with respect to tempo. Fletcher's reading of the Gymnopedies are almost as good as Parkening's, he and Anders Miolin being the only other guitarists to have recorded all three (to my knowledge). I like Parkening the best, however, because of his perfectly quiet touch and breathless recordings. Miolin is also very good but uses an alto guitar.



To earn a five-star rating, the recording must be perfect in every way and I have 2 quibbles with this one. The first is that Fletcher should have recorded more than just Gnossienne No. 1. Williams recorded two of the six Gnossiennes (seven if you count the Le Fils des étoiles as some do), and Fletcher may have been more ambition as was Pierre Laniau who recorded four of the Gnossiennes on his 10-string guitar in an all-Satie program. The Gnossiennes are lovely pieces and someone needs to record all of them on guitar.



My second major gripe is that Sports et Divertissements should have been divided into tracks so that the narration, which is interleaved with the 21 musical subpieces, could be easily skipped over or easily copied into iTunes. After the first listening or two, it is annoying to have to listen to the narration which ruins the musical flow. Experienced iTunes users will be able to sequester the music from the narration but this will be a long and tedious process. Of course, one will never be able to enjoy just the music from Sports et Divertissements directly off the CD without having to suffer through the French narrator. If not for the annoying narration (25 minutes!), it may have earned 4 stars.



If you're going to own just one all-Satie guitar recording, then this isn't the one to get. Fletcher's heavy breathing and string noise are evident on some of the quieter pieces, especially if you use headphones or sit close to the speakers. Pierre Laniau's recording, though out-of-print, is still readily available from second-hand sources and is a much better recording with many of the pieces on both Fletcher's and Laniau's CDs. Miolin's recording has more Satie guitar transcriptions than any.



A recommended, though not perfect, recording. I prefer Laniau, then Miolin, with Fletcher coming in last.



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