Satie's Oneiric Ambience...

1. SATIE’S
ONEIRIC
AMBIENCE

2. In response to ongoing industrialization and modernization,
Pius IX issued the dogmatic constitution Pastor Æternus (July 1870)
which in France contributed to the so-called ‘Ralliement ’--
t h e r e s u r g e n c e o f u l t r a m o n t a n e o b s c u r a n t i s m
i n f e r m e n t a t i v e m y s t i c i s m .

3. At the Fin de Siècle, artists and
intellectuals were drawn to the
Ralliement aesthetic--e.g. Satie,
who intuited a modality of dreamy
t i m e l e s s a s a n e l e m e n t a l
p r i n c i p l e o f s t y l e .

4. From 1886, Satie issued a series of
inscrutably haunting piano miniatures
exercising this style--viz., Ogives,
S a r a b a n d e s , G y m n o p é d i e s ,
Gnossiennes, Sonneries, Danses,
P r é l u d e s , N o c t u r n e s , e t c .

5. In the Vexations (1893), Satie creates a lush atmosphere of
hieratic ambience using a proto-serialistic method with an hypnotic
t h è m e h a r m o n i z e d ( i n 1 2 - t o n e d i v i s i o n )
b y t r i t o n e s a n d i n v e r t e d t r i t o n e s .

6. Satie’s idiosyncratic notational orthography is expressed with
enharmonic equivalents written as odd accidentals which
o b s c u r e t o n a l i m p l i c a t i o n s .

7. Unquestionably, Satie’s chef-
d’œuvre is Socrate (1 9 1 9 )--
settings of extractions from
V i c t o r C o u s i n ’ s F r e n c h
t r a n s l a t i o n s o f P l a t o ’ s
Symposium, Phædr us, and
Phædo--in his inimitably icy
mood of austere remoteness.

8. ©
2017
Tully
Atkinson