Bertrand Chamayou: Letters to Satie
View record and artist detailsRecord and Artist Details
Genre:
Instrumental
Label: Erato
Magazine Review Date: 12/2023
Media Format: CD or Download
Media Runtime: 71
Mastering:
DDD
Catalogue Number: 5419 76964-4
![5419 76964-4. Bertrand Chamayou: Letters to Satie](https://reviews.azureedge.net/gramophone/media-thumbnails/5419769646.jpg)
Tracks:
Composition | Artist Credit |
---|---|
All Sides of the Small Stone, for Erik Satie |
John Cage, Composer
Bertrand Chamayou, Piano |
(6) Gnossiennes, Movement: No. 1 (1890) |
Erik Satie, Composer
Bertrand Chamayou, Piano |
Prelude for Meditation |
John Cage, Composer
Bertrand Chamayou, Piano |
(3) Gymnopédies, Movement: No. 1, Lent et douloureux |
Erik Satie, Composer
Bertrand Chamayou, Piano |
(6) Gnossiennes, Movement: No. 2 (1890) |
Erik Satie, Composer
Bertrand Chamayou, Piano |
(6) Gnossiennes, Movement: No. 3 (1890) |
Erik Satie, Composer
Bertrand Chamayou, Piano |
A Room |
John Cage, Composer
Bertrand Chamayou, Piano |
In a Landscape |
John Cage, Composer
Bertrand Chamayou, Piano |
(3) Petites pièces montées, Movement: De l'enfance de Pantagruel (Rêverie) |
Erik Satie, Composer
Bertrand Chamayou, Piano |
(3) Véritables préludes flasques |
Erik Satie, Composer
Bertrand Chamayou, Piano |
(3) Gymnopédies, Movement: No. 2, Lent et triste |
Erik Satie, Composer
Bertrand Chamayou, Piano |
Sports et divertissements, Movement: Le bain de mer |
Erik Satie, Composer
Bertrand Chamayou, Piano |
(6) Gnossiennes, Movement: No. 4 (1891) |
Erik Satie, Composer
Bertrand Chamayou, Piano |
Sports et divertissements, Movement: La balançoire |
Erik Satie, Composer
Bertrand Chamayou, Piano |
Swinging |
John Cage, Composer
Bertrand Chamayou, Piano |
(3) Gymnopédies, Movement: No. 3, Lent et grave |
Erik Satie, Composer
Bertrand Chamayou, Piano |
(6) Gnossiennes, Movement: No. 5 (1889) |
Erik Satie, Composer
Bertrand Chamayou, Piano |
(5) Nocturnes, Movement: Simplement |
Erik Satie, Composer
Bertrand Chamayou, Piano |
Sports et divertissements, Movement: Le tango |
Erik Satie, Composer
Bertrand Chamayou, Piano |
Perpetual Tango |
John Cage, Composer
Bertrand Chamayou, Piano |
(6) Gnossiennes, Movement: No. 6 (1897) |
Erik Satie, Composer
Bertrand Chamayou, Piano |
(3) Sarabandes, Movement: No. 3 |
Erik Satie, Composer
Bertrand Chamayou, Piano |
(6) Pieces, Movement: Songe-Creux |
Erik Satie, Composer
Bertrand Chamayou, Piano |
3 Préludes Le Fils des Étoiles, Movement: Prélude du premier acte. La vocation |
Erik Satie, Composer
Bertrand Chamayou, Piano |
(6) Gnossiennes, Movement: Gnossienne, 'Gnossienne No. 7' (from Fils d'étoiles: 1891) |
Erik Satie, Composer
Bertrand Chamayou, Piano |
3 Pages in the Shape of a Pear |
James Tenney, Composer
Bertrand Chamayou, Piano |
Dream |
John Cage, Composer
Bertrand Chamayou, Piano |
Author: Pwyll ap Siôn
John Cage and Erik Satie never corresponded – the young American would only have been 12 years old when the French composer died in 1925 – but had they done so, one suspects it would have been an interesting meeting of creative minds.
Both composers eschewed convention, routine and tradition, but beyond this there are also similarities in musical style, which may come as a surprise to those expecting the usual shock-value associated with Cage. As pianist Bertrand Chamayou writes in his booklet notes for ‘Letter(s) to Erik Satie’, a direct lineage connecting the two can be heard in the calm, meditative qualities of Cage’s Dream and In a Landscape, both composed in 1948, when Cage was poring over Satie’s manuscripts at the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris.
As with Satie, the challenge with these deceptively simple pieces is to maintain perfect balance, weight, poise and equilibrium in the music throughout, alongside a clear sense of line and unswerving tempo. Chamayou manages this quite brilliantly in In a Landscape. He avoids adding any rubato, as heard in Alexei Lubimov (ECM, 7/02), and doesn’t make too much of the difference between melody and accompaniment. Unlike Herbert Henck (ECM, 10/05), Chamayou is also economical with the damper pedal, thereby avoiding too many blurred edges. Chamayou carries this approach into the Satie pieces, applying a relatively ‘brisk’ tempo in the three Gymnopédies and seven Gnossiennes to sculpt and shape lines and phrases with delicacy, care, warmth and subtlety.
Satie’s less-is-more approach is even more keenly felt in the recent chance discovery of a hitherto unknown Cage composition (this is Cage, after all). In December 2015 composer James Tenney’s widow, Lauren Pratt, unearthed a one-page manuscript hidden in one of her late husband’s scores, titled All Sides of the Small Stone, for Erik Satie. Based on a delicate harmonic ostinato that circles four-and-a-half times, around which is woven a softly swaying melodic line, Cage’s four-minute piece could easily be mistaken for a lost Gymnopédie. Satie would surely have approved.
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