The ''Véritables Préludes flasques (pour un chien)'' (''True Flabby Preludes for a Dog'') is a 1912 piano composition by

Erik Satie Eric Alfred Leslie Satie (born 17 May 18661 July 1925), better known as Erik Satie, was a French composer and pianist. The son of a French father and a British mother, he studied at the Conservatoire de Paris, Paris Conservatoire but was an undi ...

. The first of his published humoristic piano suites of the 1910s, it signified a breakthrough in his creative development and in the public perception of his music. In performance it lasts about 5 minutes. Satie biographer Rollo H. Myers, writing in 1948, remarked on the prophetic nature of this seemingly unassuming keyboard suite: "In the heyday of

Impressionism Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement characterized by visible brush strokes, open Composition (visual arts), composition, emphasis on accurate depiction of light in its changing qualities (often accentuating the effects of the passage ...

...came the ''Flabby Preludes'' which in their linear austerity heralded the Neoclassic vogue which was to dominate Western music during the nineteen-twenties."

Background

The ''Véritables Préludes flasques (pour un chien)'' represents Satie's determination to reconcile his belated education at the

Schola Cantorum The Schola Cantorum de Paris ( being ) is a private conservatory in Paris. It was founded in 1894 by Charles Bordes, Alexandre Guilmant and Vincent d'Indy as a counterbalance to the Paris Conservatoire's emphasis on opera. History The Schol ...

in Paris under

Vincent d'Indy Paul Marie Théodore Vincent d'Indy (; 27 March 18512 December 1931) was a French composer and teacher. His influence as a teacher, in particular, was considerable. He was a co-founder of the Schola Cantorum de Paris and also taught at the Pa ...

(1905-1912) with his own natural sense of wit and fantasy. It was in fact his second attempt at creating a composition on a canine theme, an idea that had long obsessed him. In July 1912 Satie composed his piano suite ''

Préludes flasques (pour un chien) The ''Préludes flasques (pour un chien)'' – ''Flabby Preludes (For a Dog)'' – is a set of four piano pieces composed in July 1912 by Erik Satie. In performance it lasts about 5 minutes. The work demonstrates Satie's attempts to reconcile the ...

'', but after it was rejected for publication by the Durand firm he informed his protégé

Alexis Roland-Manuel Alexis Roland-Manuel (22 March 18911 November 1966) was a French composer and critic, remembered mainly for his criticism. Biography He was born Roland Alexis Manuel Lévy in Paris, to a family of Belgian and Jewish origins. He studied composi ...

that he was going to rewrite it from scratch. The three pieces of the new set were completed between August 12 and August 23, 1912. On September 13 Satie offered it to publisher E. Demets, who not only bought the work on the spot (for 50 francs) but asked for more. This modest triumph convinced Satie that he was on the right creative path at last. On November 23, 1912, he formally ended his studies with d'Indy. As

Robert Orledge Robert Orledge (born 5 January 1948) is a British musicologist who specialises in French music from the late 19th to early 20th centuries. A Professor Emeritus at the University of Liverpool, Orledge has published book-length studies on the comp ...

noted, "Once Satie could laugh at the Schola and himself he was back on course." The ''Véritables Préludes flasques'' were published the following month. Unlike Durand, Demets saw commercial potential in the amusing novelty of the ''Préludes''. The firm would publish 10 of Satie's humoristic piano suites over the next four years.

Music and texts

Despite Satie's description of them as "flabby", the three ''Véritables Préludes flasques (pour un chien)'' are lean, dry, and starkly contrapuntal: :1. ''Sévère réprimande'' (''Severe Reprimand'') :2. ''Seul à la maison'' (''Home Alone'') :3. ''On joue'' (''We Play'') Composer

Charles Koechlin Charles-Louis-Eugène Koechlin (; 27 November 186731 December 1950), commonly known as Charles Koechlin, was a French composer, teacher and musicologist. Among his better known works is '' Les Heures persanes'', a set of piano pieces based on th ...

observed that here Satie "gets rid of repetitions and redundancies. He prunes, throws out ballast, suppresses held notes, condenses, reduces the musical dialogue to a strict minimum." Biographer Pierre-Daniel Templier noted that "The novelty of the flabby preludes came as a charming surprise. Yet Satie's imagination is still kept in check here. ''Sévère réprimande'', a lively and emphatic toccata with singing bass chords; ''Seul à la maison'', a delightful two-part invention; ''On joue'', with lightly bouncing fourths and fifths and minor sevenths climbing menacingly up the keyboard: no trace of humor here, in the music. But the directions are in mock Latin..." These Latin directions include ''corpulentus'' (fat), ''epotus'' (drunken), ''caeremoniosus'' (ceremonially), ''paululum'' (tiny), ''opacus'' (shady) and, in a possible dig at d'Indy, ''paedagogus'' (schoolmaster).

Performance

Satie dedicated the ''Véritables Préludes flasques (pour un chien)'' to pianist

Ricardo Viñes Ricardo Viñes y Roda (, , ; 5 February 1875 – 29 April 1943) was a Spanish pianist. He gave the premieres of works by Ravel, Debussy, Satie, Falla and Albéniz. He was the piano teacher of the composer Francis Poulenc and the pianists M ...

, who gave the successful premiere of the work at a concert of the

Société Nationale de Musique Groupe Lactalis S.A. (doing business as Lactalis) is a French multinational dairy products corporation, owned by the Besnier family and based in Laval, Mayenne, France. The company's former name was Besnier S.A. Lactalis is the largest dairy pr ...

at the

Salle Pleyel The Salle Pleyel (, meaning "Pleyel Hall") is a concert hall in the 8th arrondissement of Paris, France, designed by the acoustician Gustave Lyon together with the architect Jacques Marcel Auburtin, who died in 1926, and the work was completed i ...

in Paris on April 5, 1913. Viñes would become the foremost champion of Satie's keyboard music through the early 1920s, premiering several of his compositions. Satie was delighted by the "irresistibly droll air of secrecy" of his interpretations.Erik Satie, autobiographical blurb for publisher E. Demets' Bulletin des Editions musicales, December 1913. Quoted in Nigel Wilkins, "The Writings of Erik Satie", Eulenburg Books, London, 1980, p. 79. Viñes was also the piano teacher of

Francis Poulenc Francis Jean Marcel Poulenc (; 7 January 189930 January 1963) was a French composer and pianist. His compositions include mélodie, songs, solo piano works, chamber music, choral pieces, operas, ballets, and orchestral concert music. Among th ...

, an important Satie protégé and future member of

Les Six "Les Six" () is a name given to a group of six composers, five of them French and one Swiss, who lived and worked in Montparnasse. The name has its origins in two 1920 articles by critic Henri Collet in '' Comœdia'' (see Bibliography). Their mu ...

Recordings

Aldo Ciccolini Aldo Ciccolini (; 15 August 1925 – 1 February 2015) was an Italian pianist who became a naturalized French citizen in 1971. Biography Aldo Ciccolini was born in Naples. His father, whose family bore the title of Marquis in the city of Macera ...

(twice, in 1968 for Angel Records and 1988 for EMI);

Frank Glazer Frank Glazer (February 19, 1915 – January 13, 2015) was an American pianist, composer, and teacher of music. Career details Glazer was born in Chester, Wisconsin on February 19, 1915, the sixth child of Benjamin and Clara Glazer, Jewish emigran ...

(Vox, 1968, reissued 1990); Jean-Joël Barbier (Universal Classics France, 1971); William Masselos (RCA, 1968);

Grant Johannesen Grant Johannesen (July 30, 1921 – March 27, 2005) was an American pianist. Biography Johannesen was born in Salt Lake City and discovered at the age of five by a teacher who lived across the street. He imitated whatever he heard her play, a ...

(Vox, 1976); Yūji Takahashi (Denon, 1979);

France Clidat France Clidat (Nantes, 22 November 1932 – Paris, 17 May 2012) was a French piano, pianist renowned for her interpretations of the works of Franz Liszt, a great many of which she recorded, and Erik Satie, whose complete piano works she recorded. ...

(Forlane, 1984); Johannes Cernota (PolJazz, 1984);

Roland Pöntinen Roland Peter Pöntinen (born 1963 in Stockholm, Sweden) is a Swedish pianist and composer. Pöntinen was born to an Ingrian Finnish father and Swedish mother. He studied at the Adolf Fredrik's Music School and the Royal Swedish Academy of Music ...

(BIS, 1986); Jan Kaspersen (Olufsen Records, 1987);

Anne Queffélec Anne Queffélec (born 17 January 1948) is a French classical pianist, born in Paris. Biography Anne Queffélec is the daughter of Henri Queffélec and sister of Yann Queffélec, both noted writers. Her brother Hervé Queffélec is a mathema ...

(Virgin Classics, 1988);

Peter Dickinson Peter Malcolm de Brissac Dickinson OBE FRSL (16 December 1927 – 16 December 2015) was an English author and poet, best known for children's books and detective stories. Dickinson won the annual Carnegie Medal from the Library Association ...

(Classical Collection, 1990, reissued by Olympia, 2001);

Joanna MacGregor Joanna Clare MacGregor (born 16 July 1959) is a British concert pianist, conductor, composer, and festival curator. She is Head of Piano at the Royal Academy of Music and a professor of the University of London. She was artistic director of t ...

(Collins Records, 1992);

Gabriel Tacchino Gabriel Tacchino (; 4 August 1934 – 29 January 2023) was a French classical pianist and teacher. Life and career Tacchino was born in Cannes on 4 August 1934. He studied at the Conservatoire de Paris, Paris Conservatoire from 1947 to 1953, whe ...

(Disques

Pierre Verany Disques Pierre Verany is a French classical music record label named after its founder and producer. Verany, a producer and sound engineer, ran his own label "Disques Pierre Verany" for many years — concentrating on Italian and French baroque mus ...

, 1993); Jean-Pierre Armengaud (Circé, 1990, reissued 2000);

Michel Legrand Michel Jean Legrand (; 24 February 1932 – 26 January 2019) was a French musical composer, arranger, conductor, jazz pianist, and singer. Legrand was a prolific composer, having written over 200 film and television scores, in addition to ma ...

(

Erato Records Erato Records is a record label founded in 1953 as Erato Disques S.A. by Philippe Loury to promote French classical music. Loury was head of éditions musicales Costallat. His first releases in France were licensed from the Haydn Society of Bo ...

, 1993); Klára Körmendi (Naxos, 1993); Bojan Gorišek (Audiophile Classics, 1994); Olof Höjer (Swedish Society Discofil, 1996);

Jean-Yves Thibaudet Jean-Yves Thibaudet (born 7 September 1961)Michael & Joyce Kennedy, 2007. is a French pianist. Early life and education Thibaudet was born in Lyon, France, to non-professional musical parents. His father played the violin, and his mother, of Ger ...

(Decca, 2003);

Steffen Schleiermacher Steffen Schleiermacher (born Halle, 3 May 1960) is a German composer, pianist, and conductor.Homepage
of Steffen ...

(MDG, 2005); Cristina Ariagno (Brilliant Classics, 2006);

Alexandre Tharaud Alexandre Tharaud (born 9 December 1968) is a French pianist. He is active on the concert stage and has released a large and diverse discography. Life and career Born in Paris, Tharaud discovered the music scene through his mother who was a danc ...

(Harmonia Mundi, 2009);

Katia and Marielle Labèque The Labèque sisters, Katia (born 11 March 1950) and Marielle (born 6 March 1952), are an internationally recognised French piano duo. Biography Education and first performances Katia and Marielle Labèque were born in Bayonne, on the southwest ...

(KML, 2009), Jeroen van Veen (Brilliant Classics, 2016).

References

External links

* {{Authority control Compositions by Erik Satie Compositions for solo piano 1912 compositions Neoclassicism (music)