Unsung Podcast

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Episode 181 - Gnossienne no. 1 - 6 by Erik Satie

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Whilst any meaningful distinction between what is “high” and what is “low” are is surely a conversation born out of complete nonsense (who gets to decide this things? Why do such individuals fall into these categories? etc), what we can say is that we are very much out of our wheelhouse on this episode. That’s right. We’re going classical. We’re going Erik Satie.

Look, classical musical analysis is really not our forte but we give it a damn good go on this episode (with proper credit applied where necessary). As some of Christopher’s favourite pieces of music Gnossienne is something he’d been itching to do for a wee while. There’s a good chance you’ve heard at least some of numbers 1 to 3 in a film at some point over the years. Indeed, just like at Satie’s IMDb entry to see how many films his music has appeared in. It’s a lot.

Anyway, Erik Satie was a bit mad. We won’t spoil it for you by talking about it here - really, you need to listen to get the full measure of his strangeness - but what is often agreed upon is that he’s the father of ambient music. We talk about that, and so much more, in this week’s show.

Is he unsung though? You decide.