Impressionism and modernityErik Satie
Erik Satie was born in Honfleur, Normandy.
Erik Satie’s life
The big moments of this life, and what was happening in the world at the same time.
A life at a glance
- 1866👶 Birth
Born in Honfleur on 17 May
- 1872❤️ Private lifeage 6
Death of his mother; raised partly by his grandparents
- 1874🌍 Meanwhile
First exhibition of the Impressionist painters
- 1875🌍 Meanwhile
The Palais Garnier opera house opens in Paris
- 1879📚 Trainingage 13
Enters the Conservatoire, where he is judged lazy
- 1888🎼 Workage 22
Three Gymnopédies
- 1890🎼 Workage 24
Gnossiennes, without bar lines
- 1903🌍 Meanwhile
First powered aeroplane flight (Wright brothers)
- 1912🎼 Workage 46
Humorous pieces: Véritables Préludes flasques (pour un chien)
- 1918🌍 Meanwhile
End of the First World War
- 1925🕯️ Deathage 59
Dies in Paris on 1 July
Listen to the music
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Excerpts of up to 90 seconds, freely licensed recordings from Wikimedia Commons.
Once upon a time…
Erik Satie was born in Honfleur, Normandy. At the Conservatoire his teachers thought he was lazy. But Satie had ideas all his own!
He became a pianist in the cabarets of Montmartre in Paris. He composed the Gymnopédies, very slow and gentle pieces that you still often hear today.
Satie loved jokes: he gave his pieces strange titles like “Truly Flabby Preludes (for a Dog)” and wrote odd advice on his scores. He also invented “furniture music”, music you don’t have to listen to, like a piece of furniture in a room!
After his death, more than eighty umbrellas and a dozen identical suits were found in his home.
Erik Satie’s instruments
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