Erik Satie - Critical Lives

3.82 ( 77 Ratings by Goodreads)
Erik Satie

Erik Satie - Critical Lives

(Author)
3.82 (77 Ratings by Goodreads)
paperback
Published: 1 May, 2007
Standard worldwide delivery by Thu, June 18 - Tue, June 23
Order within 0
Condition: NEW
$23.05
Price includes shipping
Available 7 in stock
- +
Add to basket Wishlist This
FREE Returns within 30 days
More Details

Popular Books by Mary E. Davis

View All Books by Mary E. Davis
Paul Poiret
Paul Poiret
Mary E. Davis
$29.91 $33.35
New
Add to basket
The Rite of Spring at 100
The Rite of Spring at 100
Mary E. Davis
$72.22
New
Add to basket
Classic Chic
Classic Chic
Mary E. Davis
$39.50 $40.02
New
Add to basket

Description

A musical composer who dabbled in the Dada movement, a Bohemian ‘gymnopédiste’ of fin-de-siècle Montmartre, and a legendary dresser known as ‘The Velvet Gentleman’ for his sartorial choices, Erik Satie was nearly unprecedented in technique, style and philosophy among European composers in the early twentieth century. Yet his legacy has largely languished in the shadows of Stravinsky, Debussy and Ravel. Mary E. Davis now brings Satie to life in this fascinating new biography that demonstrates that his musical innovations reached as far as his influence. Satie redefined the boundaries of the composer’s art, devising new methods of artistic expression that melded ordinary elements and rarefied genres of words, visual art and music. Davis argues that Satie’s modernist aesthetic was grounded in the contradictions apparent in his life – such as enrolling in the conservative Schola Cantorum after working as a cabaret performer – and is reflected in his irreverent essays, drawings and music. Erik Satie explores how the composer was embraced by both the avant-garde and Parisian elite, an experience that immersed him in the worlds of high fashion and cutting-edge modernist art, and subsequently gave him the aesthetic impetus to create the new musical style of Neoclassicism. Satie also crucially employed the power of the image through his infamous fashion statements, Davis contends, to establish his place in the art world, and in this connection between couture and culture, Satie was at the heart of a nascent celebrity culture. A fascinating and informative portrait, with numerous illustrations that include art by Satie himself, Erik Satie reassesses the accepted history of modernist music and restores the composer to his rightful pioneering status.
See more

More Details

Type Book
ISBN13 9781861893215
ISBN10 1861893213
Number Of Pages 176
Item Weight 1000 g
Publisher / Reseller Reaktion Books
Format paperback
See More +

Media Reviews

'A welcome reassessment of Satie that places him at the hub of radical events' - Classic FM Magazine '[this] slim, yet powerful biography ... Mary E. Davis's fascinating biography adds much to our understanding about this enigmatic yet crucial modernist figure.' -Modernism/Modernity 'a lucid, elegantly written biography and a distinguished addition to the general literature on the composer ... the book's greatest asset is Davis's consistent focus on the complex social milieu of Satie's career and ways that this fertile environment shaped and defined his work. Her exploration of the symbiotic relationship between music, art, and fashion provides a solid foundation for the examination of similar issues with composers from France and beyond. Erik Satie is a welcome step in that direction.' - Notes

Show more

Author's Bio

Mary E. Davis is a member of the Capstone Faculty at Yale University’s Jackson School of Global Affairs. Her books include Classic Chic (2006), Ballets Russes Style (Reaktion, 2010) and Paul Poiret (Reaktion, 2025).

Show more