Talk:Erik Satie/Archive 2

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Archive 1 Archive 2

Section removed from article

I have removed the following unencyclopedic section. I'm placing it in a subpage so as not to clutter this Talk page. It's possible some information could be culled from it to add to the article, but as is, it's not within Wikipedia guidelines: 

:=="Petit dictionnaire d'idées reçues" (short dictionary of preconceived ideas)==
{{Prose|date=June 2010}}
{{Inappropriate tone|section|date=March 2009}}
{{multi-listen start}}
In [[Musical Instrument Digital Interface#MIDI file formats|MIDI]] file format:
{{multi-listen item|filename=Carrelage phonique.MID|title=Carrelage phonique|description=''Phonic Tiling'', No. 2 of the first set of [[Furniture music]]|format=[[MIDI]]}}
{{multi-listen end}}
"Idée reçue" is a play on words; in French it is the normal term for "prejudice", but Satie used it as the non-material equivalent of [[found object]]s (as in ''readymades'') — for example, when he incorporated odd bits of music by Saint-Saëns and [[Ambroise Thomas]] in his ''furniture music''. This section treats some popular (mis)conceptions regarding Satie and his music:

'''Satie and furniture music''': not all of Satie's music is ''[[furniture music]]''.  In the strict sense the term applies only to five of his compositions, which he wrote in 1917, 1920, and 1923. For the first public performance of ''furniture music'' see [[Entr'acte]].

'''Satie as precursor''': the only "precursor" discussion Satie was involved in during his lifetime was whether or not he was a precursor of [[Claude Debussy]], but many would follow. Over the years Satie would be described as a precursor of movements and styles as varied as [[Impressionism]], [[Neoclassicism (music)|neo-classicism]], [[Dada]], [[Surrealism]], [[atonal music|atonalism]], [[minimalism (music)|minimalism]], [[conceptual art]], the [[Theatre of the Absurd]], [[muzak]], [[ambient music]], multimedia art, etc., and as taking the first steps towards techniques such as [[prepared piano]] and music-to-film [[synchronisation]]. Further, Satie became one of the first musicians to perform a [[cameo appearance]] — he was in a 1924 film by [[René Clair]] (see: [http://hem.fyristorg.com/ebay/wav/entracte.rm a sample of the film (rm format)] and the ''[[Entr'acte]]'' article).

All by himself Satie appears to have been the precursor to half of the avant-garde movements of the 20th century. Many of these "precursorisms" are possibly based on quite superficial resemblances only, while, on the other hand, he undeniably inspired and influenced many later artists, and their ideas. According to Milhaud, Satie had "prophesied the major movements in classical music to appear over the next fifty years within his own body of work." There is a website exploring that theory in detail: [http://www.minim-media.com/satie/ Erik Satie's Crystal Ball] 

'''Satie as humorist''': many would be surprised to know how many of Satie's seemingly humorous compositions were at heart taken very seriously by him. When he forbade commentaries written in his [[partition (music)|partition]]s to be read aloud, he probably saw this himself as a means to safeguard the seriousness of his intentions. When, at the first public performance of ''[[Socrate]]'', there was laughter, he felt hurt. Many other examples of his serious attitude can be found, but there's no doubt that Satie was a witty person, certainly not without many humorous [[idiosyncrasy|idiosyncrasies]].

'''Satie and compositions in three parts''': although many of his compositions (e.g., most of the pre-[[World War I|war]] piano pieces) were indeed in three parts, there is no general rule in this respect.  After his death, publishers would force more of them into an artificial three-part structure; Satie had actually already made a joke of such proceedings with his seven-part ''Trois Morceaux en forme de poire'', which is French for "Three Pieces in the Shape of a Pear."

'''Satie and (lack of) money''': although Satie certainly knew periods of dire poverty, and was perhaps a little uncontrollable in his spending, in long periods of his life he had few worries in this sense. Although maybe not having much money in his pockets, he was (certainly from the second decade of the new century) often invited to expensive restaurants and to all sort of events, and was given financial help, by all sorts of people.

'''Satie as an opponent of other musical styles'''.  The musical styles Satie opposed were allegedly numerous: Wagnerism, Romanticism (Saint-Saëns, Franck, etc.), Impressionism (Debussy and Ravel), [[Expressionism (music)|Expressionism]] (later Ravel), Slavism ([[Stravinsky]]), post-Wagnerism ([[Arnold Schoenberg|Schoenberg]]), [[cabaret]] music, etc.  Apart from some animosities on the personal level (which can be seen as symptomatic of most adherents of avant-garde movements of those days), Satie's ideas on other music of his time generally had more subtlety; for example, about [[César Franck]] he could not be brought to write critically, but would avoid the issue with jokes ("Franck's music shows surprisingly much Franckism; Some even say César Frank was lazy, which is not a commendable property in a hard working man"). Perhaps the same can be said as above regarding "Satie as precursor": there is much empty discussion — for example, the debate with Debussy appears to have been over whether or not Satie was a precursor of Impressionism, which would not have made much sense if he had been opposed to Impressionism as such.

'''Satie and boredom'''. Satie often consciously disregarded the conception of [[musical development|development]] found in the German tradition (Beethoven, Schubert, Schumann, Brahms). Satie's compositions tend to be very short; a typical [[movement (music)|movement]] of a Satie composition takes less than two minutes to play, and compositions with more than five movements are exceptional. Even his larger-scale works conforming to the genres known in his time would be two to five times shorter than the usual duration of such compositions (''Socrate'', a [[secular]] [[oratorio]] — or "symphonic drama" — lasting about half an hour, is the longest).  In general, Satie thought it to be a great fault for a composer to bore his audience in any way. There are eight of his compositions that use repetition as a compositional technique, more than doubling the total duration:
* ''[[Vexations]]'': with 840 repetitions of the musical motif (and many more of the melody of the bass), this is definitely the longest single-movement work with a ''defined'' number of repetitions (note that, without the repetitions, the actual music takes less than two minutes to play). No explanation by Satie survives regarding the exceptional length of the piece. If excluding the ''Tango'' mentioned in the next point, performing the ''Vexations'' takes longer than all his other music played in sequence.
* For ''Le Tango'' ("The Tango"), a rather catchy tune from ''Sports et divertissements'', Satie indicates in the score ''perpétuel'' (i.e. something like a [[perpetuum mobile]], which in French is "mouvement perpétuel"). There is little indication how Satie understood this "perpetual", apart that at the premiere, at least ''assisted'' by Satie, there was obviously nothing repeated ''ad infinitum'', taken literally. When performed for a recording there is seldom more than one repeat of this part of the composition, making it one of the ''shortest'' [[tango music|tango]]s ever, something like a ''Minute Tango''.
* Five pieces of ''furniture music'', which were intended as "background" music with no number of repeats specified. The circumstances in which such music was performed by Satie himself indicate, however, that the total playing times would be intended to be the usual 'intermission' time of a stage production (see [[Entr'acte]]). While the public was not expected to be silent, these compositions can hardly be seen as an experiment in boredom.
* His music for the film ''Entr'acte'' has ten repeat zones in order to synchronise with the twenty-minute film (which has a very varied plot, so not much boredom is to be found there either).

'''Satie and sexuality''': much has been said{{By whom|date=April 2010}} about Satie's sexuality. In fact, apart from the short-lived, and highly "idealised", Valadon period, Satie's behaviour appeared more or less [[asexual]]: he tended to be dismissive when the topic of sexuality came up.{{Citation needed|date=April 2010}}

Softlavender (talk) 13:50, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

Can you explain what "unencyclopedic" means?
I had an 2007 version of wikipedia in a wikitaxi and was surprised to see how this Satie entry become much less interesting over the years.
I think this section you removed was full of hints that may well be an enriching part of a "biography".
How "encyclopedic" can you be when you're writing about an eccentric? IIIIIIIII (talk) 18:00, 6 January 2013 (UTC)

List removed from article

I've removed the following from the article -- this is from the 1919–1925 section. Information from it may be placed into the article within the appropriate section or paragraph, but not as bulleted items or a list or one-sentence paragraphs: 

{{Prose|date=June 2010}}
Other work and episodes in this last period of Satie's life:

* Since 1911 he had been on friendly terms with [[Igor Stravinsky]], about whom he would later write articles.
* ''[[Le Piège de Méduse|Le piège de Méduse]]'' (1913) had a unique position in Satie's [[oeuvre]], as it was a stage work conceived and composed seemingly without any collaboration with other artists.
* ''Sports et divertissements'' was a kind of multi-media project, in which Satie provided piano music to drawings made by [[Charles Martin (artist)|Charles Martin]]. The work was composed in 1914, but not published or performed until the early 1920s. The individual pieces are characteristic Satie "miniatures": in all, there are twenty pieces - none over two minutes in length, and some as short as 15 seconds.
* He got in trouble over an insulting postcard he had written to one of his critics shortly after the premiere of ''Parade''; he was condemned to a week of imprisonment, but was finally released as a result of the (financial) intercession of [[Winnaretta Singer]], Princess Edmond de Polignac.
* Singer, who had learnt Ancient Greek when she was over 50, had commissioned a work on [[Socrates]] in October 1916; this would become his ''[[Vie de Socrate|Socrate]]'', which he presented early in 1918 to the Princess.
* From 1917 Satie wrote five pieces of ''[[furniture music]]'' ("Musique d'ameublement") for different occasions.
* From 1920, he was on friendly terms with the circles around [[Gertrude Stein]], amongst others, leading to the publication of some of his articles in ''[[Vanity Fair magazine|Vanity Fair]]'' (commissioned by Sibyl Harris).
* Some works would originate under the patronage of the count Etienne de Beaumont, from 1922 onwards:
** ''La statue retrouvée'' (or "Divertissement"): another Satie-Cocteau-Picasso-Massine collaboration.
** ''Ludions'': a setting of [[nonsense verse|nonsense rhyme]] by [[Léon-Paul Fargue]]
** ''[[Mercure]]'': the subtitle of this piece ("Poses plastiques") suggests it might have been intended rather as an emulation of the [[tableau vivant]] genre than as an actual ballet, the "tableaux" being cubist, by Picasso (and Massine).
* During his final years Satie travelled; for example, in 1924 to Belgium, invited by Paul Collaer, and to [[Monte Carlo]] for the premiere of a work on which he had collaborated.

Softlavender (talk) 14:02, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

This disruptive delete (that made way for an accumulation of cruft, see below) has been undone: there's no reason why a transformation from list information to prose can't be performed in mainspace. --Francis Schonken (talk) 12:52, 8 September 2017 (UTC)

Downgrading this to a Start class for now

Due to the fact that so much of the article has been removed (see previous two headers), I've downgraded this article to Start class. A lot of the material from the removed sections can be reintroduced into the article, but that needs to be done in encyclopedic and organized sections and headings, not as random bits of disassociated stuff. Softlavender (talk) 16:09, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

Better photo?

Must be a better photo to use.

Such as this one: http://imgur.com/5z97tSI CrocodilesAreForWimps (talk) 16:18, 16 December 2013 (UTC)

External links modified

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IMDb

User:Ibodile added {{IMDb name}} (Erik Satie at IMDb) to the external links. User:Classicalfan626 then removed it with the edit summary "Wikipedia is not a link repository. Of what use(s) is IMDb for a classical composer? Please revert if you can provide a valid reason." I think that IMDb link provides a succinct list of Satie's music in films and complies with WP:EL; it should be restored (and considered as a standard link for all composers). -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 03:56, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

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Moved here from mainspace

:==Arrangements in popular music==
:===''Gymnopédies''===

{{main|Gymnopédies}}
* In 1963, ''[[The Fire Within]]'' (French: ''Le Feu follet''), one of [[Louis Malle]]'s early films, used Gymnopédie No. 1 and [[Gnossiennes|Gnossienne Nos. 1, 2 and 3]] to score the film.
* In 1968, [[Blood, Sweat & Tears]] released their eponymous second album, which included an adaptation of ''Gymnopédie No. 1'' (arranged by [[Dick Halligan]]) which they titled as ''Variations on a Theme by Erik Satie (First and Second Movements)''. The first movement is a straightforward elaboration of the basic theme using flutes, an acoustic guitar and a triangle. The second is a far more abstract variation using only brass instruments. In 1969, Halligan received a Grammy Award for Best Instrumental Performance for the piece.
* In 1974, the jazz flutist [[Hubert Laws]] recorded an arrangement by [[Bob James (musician)|Bob James]] of the ''Gymnopédie No. 1'' in his ''In the Beginning'' double album. The band featured keyboardist [[Bob James (musician)|Bob James]], guitarist [[Gene Bertoncini]], bassist [[Ron Carter]], drummer [[Steve Gadd]], three strings, and Hubert's brother [[Ronnie Laws]] on tenor sax.
* In 1979 the band [[Sky (band)|Sky]] included a version of ''Gymnopédie No. 1'', which was arranged by [[John Williams (guitarist)|John Williams]], on the band's first album ''[[Sky (Sky album)|Sky]]''.
* In 1980, [[Gary Numan]]'s single "[[We Are Glass]]" featured ''Gymnopédie No. 1'' on the B-side.
* ''Gymnopédie No. 1'' is featured in the 1981 film ''[[My Dinner with Andre]]'', directed by [[Louis Malle]] (the episode '[[Critical Film Studies]]' of the [[NBC]] show ''[[Community (TV series)|Community]]'' – the episode itself an homage to ''My Dinner with Andre'' – also features ''Gymnopédie No. 1'').
* In 1990, Movement 98's ([[Paul Oakenfold]] and [[Steve Osborne]]) single "Joy and Heartbreak" used the opening phrase of ''Trois Gymnopédies'' as the intro and instrumental.
* The 1993 [[John Tesh]] album ''Winter Song'' contains an arrangement of ''Gymnopédie No. 1'' entitled ''Seabury Road''.
* [[Janet Jackson]] released the single "[[Someone to Call My Lover]]" in 2001 from her seventh studio album, ''[[All for You (Janet Jackson album)|All for You]]''. The chorus of the song includes a loop of ''Gymnopédie No. 1'' played in 4/4 time instead of the original 3/4. Jackson had loved the Gymnopédie since childhood and wanted to incorporate its theme into one of her own songs.
* The English electronic duo [[Isan (band)|Isan]] recorded versions of the ''Trois Gymnopédies'' for a 2006 7-inch single, "Trois Gymnopédies" on the [[Morr Music]] record label.
* The 2001 movie ''[[The Royal Tenenbaums]]'' features an arrangement of the ''Gymnopédie No. 1''.
* The 2006 video game ''[[Mother 3]]'' features an arrangement of the ''Gymnopédie No. 1'' as background music, titled "Leder's Gymnopédie".
* The 2008 documentary film ''[[Man on Wire]]'' features both ''Gymnopédie No. 1'' and ''Gnossienne No. 1''.
* The 2009 independent film ''[[Mr. Nobody (film)|Mr. Nobody]]'' features both ''Gymnopédie No. 3'' and ''Gnossienne No. 3''.<ref name="imdb.com">{{cite web|url=http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0006273/|title=Erik Satie|website=IMDb|accessdate=1 August 2017}}</ref>
* ''Gymnopédie No. 2'' has been used in the [[original soundtrack]] of 2010 Japanese [[anime|animated film]] ''[[The Disappearance of Haruhi Suzumiya]]'' by [[Kyoto Animation]] studio. The full ''Gymnopédies'' as well as ''Gnossiennes'' are included in the 2nd CD of this OST.
* In 2012, ''Gymnopédie No. 1'' was used in the video for [[Lana Del Rey]]'s song  "Carmen"
* An arrangement of ''Gymnopédie No. 1'' was featured on [[Anamanaguchi]]'s 2013 album, ''[[Endless Fantasy]]''.
* In 2013, [[Flying Lotus]] sampled ''Gymnopédie No. 1'' in "Puppet Talk".

:===''Gnossiennes''===
{{main|Gnossiennes}}
* In 1963, ''[[The Fire Within]]'' (French: ''Le Feu follet''), one of [[Louis Malle]]'s early films, used ''[[Gymnopédies|Gymnopédie No. 1]]'' and ''Gnossienne Nos. 1, 2 and 3'' to score the film.
* ''Gnossiennes #4 & #5'' appear in the 1979 film ''[[Being There]]''.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0078841/soundtrack?ref_=tt_trv_snd|title=''Being There'' (1979) – Soundtracks |website=IMDb.com|accessdate=2017-08-01}}</ref>
* The 1989 film [[Violent Cop (1989 film)|Violent Cop]] features ''Gnossienne No.1''.
* In 1994, [[Malcolm McLaren]] arranged ''Gnossienne Nos. 3 and 4'' in his concept album ''Paris''.
* In 1995, [[The Folk Implosion|Folk Implosion]] used a sample of ''Gnossienne No. 1'' in the song 'Wet Stuff', which was part of the soundtrack of "[[Kids (film)|Kids]]", a movie by [[Larry Clark]]
* In 1996, the Swedish film ''Vinterviken'' <ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0118083/soundtrack?ref_=tt_trv_snd|title=Vinterviken (1996)|website=IMDb.com|accessdate=1 August 2017}}</ref> featured ''Gnossienne No. 1'' performed by Roland Pöntinen.
* The 2000 film ''[[Chocolat (2000 film)|Chocolat]]'' features ''Gnossiennes 1, 2, and 3''.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0241303/soundtrack?ref_=tt_trv_snd|title=''Chocolat'' (2000) – Soundtracks |website=IMDb.com|accessdate=2017-08-01}}</ref>
* The 2002 film ''[[About Schmidt]]'' features ''Gnossienne no. 4 – Lent''.
* ''Gnossienne No. 1'' is used in the 2003 episode "[[Five Little Pigs]]" of [[Agatha Christie's Poirot]].
* The 2005 movie ''[[Revolver (2005 film)|Revolver]]'' features ''Gnossienne No. 1'' in the ending credits.
* The 2006 movie ''[[The Painted Veil (2006 film)|The Painted Veil]]'' features ''Gnossienne No. 1'' throughout the film.
* The 2008 documentary film ''[[Man on Wire]]'' features both ''Gymnopédie No. 1'' and ''Gnossienne No. 1''.
* In 2011, singer-songwriter [[Tori Amos]] released an album entitled ''[[Night of Hunters]]'', where her song "Battle of Trees" is a variation on ''Gnossienne No. 1''.
* ''Gnossienne No. 1'' was used in the 2011 film ''[[Hugo (film)|Hugo]]''.
* In 2011, James Blake used ''Gnossienne No. 5'' as the opening track of his BBC Radio 1 Essential Mix.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://soundcloud.com/indieofiloweb/james-blake-essential-mix-17|title=James Blake (Essential mix 17-09-2011)|work=SoundCloud}}</ref>
* In the 2014 movie ''[[The November Man]]'', actress ''[[Olga Kurylenko]]'' plays ''Gnossienne No. 3''.
* The 2015 erotic drama film ''[[Love_(2015_film)|Love]]'' features both ''Gymnopédie No. 1'' and ''Gnossienne No. 1''. <ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3774694/soundtrack?ref_=tt_ql_trv_7|title=Love (2015)|website=IMDb.com|accessdate=1 August 2017}}</ref>
* ''Gnossienne No. 1'' was used in TV series ''[[Mr. Robot (TV series)|Mr. Robot]]'s Season 2 Episode 10'' opening scene.
* In 2017, rapper ''[[G Eazy]]'' and DJ ''[[Carnage (DJ)|Carnage]]'' used a sample of ''Gnossienne No. 1'' for the first single of the ''Step Brothers'' album, ''"Guala"'' Featuring Bay Area rapper Thirty Rack.

:===Others===
* In 1972, Satie was fashioned for the [[Moog synthesizer]] as "The Electronic Spirit of Erik Satie," performed with the Camarata Contemporary Chamber Orchestra. The same orchestra had created another Satie interpretation called "The Velvet Gentleman" in 1970.
* In 1983, [[Dave Greenfield]] and [[Jean-Jacques Burnel]] of UK band [[The Stranglers]], recorded "Trois Pédophiles pour Eric Sabyr" in homage to Satie. An instrumental piece, it was the first track on the B-side of their album ''[[Fire & Water (Ecoutez Vos Murs)]]''.
* In 1987, [[electronic music]] composer [[Mitar Subotić]] on his debut album ''Disillusioned!'', released under the pseudonym Rex Ilusivii, recorded an instrumental track "Thanx Mr. Rorschach – Ambijenti na muziku Erika Satija" (Thanx Mr. Rorschach – Ambient to the music by Erik Satie), as a kind of a musical [[Rorschach test]] to the music by Satie.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.discogs.com/viewimages?release=1148256 |title=Images for Rex Ilusivii – Disillusioned! |publisher=Discogs.com |date= |accessdate=2012-03-03}}</ref>
* In 1989, the [[Vienna Art Orchestra]] (directed by [[Mathias Rüegg]]) released ''The Minimalism of Eric Satie'', a 2-LP set on the Swiss [[Hathut Records|HatART]] label that included "reflections" on a number of Satie's works, notably three performances of [[Vexations]] in various instrumental/vocal combinations.
* In 1997, the Canadian soprano [[Patricia O'Callaghan]] included songs by Satie on her debut solo album ''Youkali'' and still performs them as part of her cabaret act.
* In 1999, electronic music act [[Plaid (band)|Plaid]]'s CD ''Restproof Clockwork'' included a track called "Tearisci" which is an uncredited version of Satie's "Pièces Froides, No. 2: Danses De Travers: III. Encore".
* In 2000, ex-[[Genesis (band)|Genesis]] guitarist [[Steve Hackett]] released the album ''Sketches of Satie'', performing Satie's works on acoustic guitar, with contributions by his brother [[John Hackett (musician)|John]] on [[flute]].
* In 2001, the Josh G. Abrahams Radio Remix of "[[Come What May (2001 song)|Come What May]]" from the film ''[[Moulin Rouge!]]'' sampled Satie's "Petit prélude à la journée" from ''Enfantillages pittoresques'' prominently throughout the single.<ref>{{cite web|last=Bassanese|first=Paola|title=Classical Music Made into Pop Music: Sampling and Homages|url=http://itcher.com/mag/classical-music-made-into-pop-music/|work=Itcher Magazine|accessdate=9 March 2014}}</ref>
* Ogive Number 2 (incorrectly labelled Ogive Number 1) was re-recorded electronically by [[William Orbit]] on his album ''[[Pieces in a Modern Style]]''.
{{reflist-talk}}

This is entirely about compositions, not about the composer — even as a reception topic it is completely unbalanced and doesn't give the faintest idea why and how the composer's music became widely accepted. --Francis Schonken (talk) 12:18, 8 September 2017 (UTC)

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Guidelines for a complete rewrite?

Hi all,

There are noted problems with this article, and I suggest the article needs a complete rewrite. It would seem that the strategy of minor changes paired with discussion will leave the community with a substandard entry for longer than should be tolerated. What is the conventional wisdom related to full page edits? How should this be approached in a way that engages the community but also improves this page quickly and with consistency?

If active editors on this page don't chime in, I will do my best to adhere to the wikipedia edit guidelines. 77.165.64.198 (talk) 00:35, 17 June 2018 (UTC)

Sourced material removed

Some well referenced material was removed from the article. Erik Satie was a well known eccentric, in his later years he only ate white foods. The content is relevant to the article.

"In his later years, Satie lived on a unique diet of exclusively white foods and wore only grey suits.[1][2] In his book Memoirs of An Amnesiac, he commented that "my only nourishment consists of food that is white: eggs, sugar, grated bones, the fat of dead animals, veal, salt, coconuts, chicken cooked in white water, fruit-mould, rice, turnips, camphorated sausages, pastry, cheese (white varieties), cotton salad, and certain kinds of fish (without their skin)."[2][3]

The removal reason was "none of these sources are mainstream reliable sources on Erik Satie: take to the talk page if you think this minority view deserves a place in Satie's article)" [1], which is incorrect. These are mainstream published sources from respectable publishers (Villard (imprint), University of Minnesota Press). I have a BSc in food science. 90% of my edits are on the subject on this Wiki and I have never run into the problem. I do not add "minority" views. The content I added merely quotes Satie's personal diet, even a personal quote from himself. This is non-controversial content and the removal reason is not valid per policy here at Wikipedia. An entire book does not need to be published on Erik Satie to be included on the article. Those references mention him on a couple of pages. The claim that the sources are not mainstream is incorrect. Professor Cecilia Novero, for example is a published historian, Antidiets of the Avant-Garde: From Futurist Cooking to Eat Art contains content on Erik Satie. Psychologist Guy (talk) 20:37, 21 January 2020 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ Byrnside, Ronald L. (1990). Music: Sound and Sense. W. C. Brown. p. 251
  2. ^ a b Weeks, David Joseph; James, Jamie. (1995). Eccentrics: A Study of Sanity and Strangeness. Villard Books. p. 83
  3. ^ Novero, Cecilia. (2010). Antidiets of the Avant-garde: From Futurist Cooking to Eat Art. University of Minnesota Press. p. 74. ISBN 978-0-8166-4601-2

Satie and white foods

This article has the larger quote from Satie's Memoirs of an Amnesiac.

The second paragraph has:

... A healthy ride on horseback round my domain follows from 1:19 P.M. to 2:53 P.M. ...

The third paragraph has:

... Once a week, I wake up with a start at 3:19 (Tuesdays).

The fourth paragraph has:

My only nourishment consists of food that is white: ... I boil my wine ...

The seventh paragraph has:

... Once every hour a servant takes my temperature and gives me another.

The ninth paragraph has:

My doctor has always told me to smoke. ...

Clue: Satie never had a "domain" (he rented a small apartment), nor a horse, nor a servant (nobody, not even his friends, leave alone "servants", were ever allowed in his apartment during his lifetime). Satie often ate with friends and others who supported him, on their invitation, where he ate what was put before him, and drank his whine without boiling it, and smoked, notwithstanding a chronic lung condition. In sum, no conclusion whatsoever can be drawn regarding his "diet" from the Memoirs of an Amnesiac. One could as well believe that Dante actually met Virgil because he said so in the Divina Commedia.

So, any source that takes Satie's Memoirs of an Amnesiac literally should be rejected out of hand, and content derived from such credulous (in fact: superstitious) source removed from the article on sight. --Francis Schonken (talk) 20:38, 21 January 2020 (UTC)

We should not be rejecting what reliable secondary sources say for your own original research. We have reliable sources saying Erik Satie only ate white foods, and this was his daily routine in his later years and he wore only grey suits. You are basically telling us to reject reliable sources because you personally disagree with it. What you are doing is not policy based and this should be taken to another avenue so other users can examine this. You are saying content is false from reliable sources, that is a personal opinion and violates WP:OR. It is not up to us to say if content from reliable sources is true or false.
You also claim these are "credulous" or "superstitious" sources, which is false. They are mainstream sources, two of them published by qualified historians. Psychologist Guy (talk) 21:02, 21 January 2020 (UTC)

As said, this is a minority view. The material should be weighed against what mainstream reliable sources say: major mainstream reliable sources on Satie, like Orledge and Volta, will not take this literally. So, look up what these sources have to say on the matter, and include it in the article before adding the minority view (i.e. that this should be taken literally). That is WP:NPOV policy: nobody benefits from a distorted WP:REDFLAG view based on rather remote sources (which, I maintain, are probably not very relevant on the matter). --Francis Schonken (talk) 21:33, 21 January 2020 (UTC)

No it is not a minority view. You have not given me any reliable sources saying he did not eat white foods. I have given reliable sources saying the opposite. If he did not eat white foods then why are there many sources saying otherwise? Here are some sources that indicate Erik Satie was an eccentric who ate a diet of white foods.
  • "Erik Satie's behavior has earned him the label "eccentric." He appended his signature with "gentle, medieval musician," and it is said that he wore nothing but gray suits, and that he ate nothing but white foods." (Ronald L. Byrnside, Music: Sound and Sense, p. 251).
  • "Erik Satie, when he was working on his oratorio “Socrate” (1917-18), wrote to a friend, “I want it to be as white and pure as antiquity.” On the days when he was composing, he said, he ate only white foods." [2] (Joan Acocella, The New Yorker).
  • "This was a composer who wore identical velvet corduroy suits every day for 10 years; who said he only ate white food; who was friends with some of the most important names in European culture – Picasso, Debussy, Ravel, Poulenc. Yet he lived not just in squalor, but in isolation, too." (Ben East, [3])
  • "He owned twelve identical grey velvet suits – wearing one at a time until it wore out, where he promptly moved on to the next – and was obsessed with eating only white or pale-coloured food. In his dairies, Satie outlines his peculiar dietary requirements with Rain Man-esque precision: “I can only eat white foods: eggs, sugar, scraped bones, fat from dead animals, veal, salt, coconuts, chicken cooked in white water, rice, turnips, things like pasta, white cheese, cotton salad and certain fish." ("The nuttiest composers of all time" Australian Music Examinations Board)
  • "Bowler-hatted Satie spent most of his life pushing the boundaries, so it’s no surprise that he wins the musical laurels when it comes to weird eating habits. When he went out, he wore only grey velvet and he ate only white foods. In this list the composer included eggs, sugar, animal fat, salt, coconuts, rice, turnips, pastry, white cheese, certain kinds of fish and shredded bones. He also refused to speak while eating as he was convinced he would choke to death." ("15 Composers who loved their food", BBC Music Magazine)
  • "Here was a man who bought seven identical yellow corduroy suits, one for each day of the week, so he never had to waste time deciding what he was going to wear. Here was a man who for a time only consumed white foods, in the hope that their simplicity and purity would inform his music. Once I started to research Satie's life in detail, I was captivated by the strangeness and complexity of the man, but also by his fierce resolve to change music forever." ("Erik and Me: Alistair McGowan on Satie", Alistair McGowan)
  • "Among the many eccentricities of the French composer Erik Satie was his diet confined to white foods – eggs, sugar, shredded bones, the fat of dead animals, coconuts, chicken cooked in white water, rice, cheese (white varieties) and certain kinds of fish (without their skin). Satie thought that white foods got him into the mood for musical compositions that were unimpassioned and lucid". (Steven Shapin. You are what you eat’: historical changes in ideas about food and identity)
That last source, is a peer reviewed paper by Steven Shapin published in Historical Research, 2014. As I said before we should just report what the sources say. I couldn't care less about what this man believed or his crank ideas. The references indicate the man was an eccentric when it came to his eating habits and did this strange diet of white foods to develop his compositions, so that it what we should cite. I do not see why one line about his dieting ideas is controversial and should be removed. I am all for removing fringe content but this is not fringe, it is reliably sourced. It appears this is a low-traffic talk-page so this should be taken to another venue so other users can weigh in. Probably here. Psychologist Guy (talk) 22:06, 21 January 2020 (UTC)
"Major mainstream reliable sources on Satie, like Orledge and Volta, will not take this literally." The evidence suggests the opposite. I have not read those biographies but one peer-reviewed paper mentions Ornella Volta's biography of Satie which says he probably ate only white foods, so that is to be taken literally.
The following note (reference 29) can be found in the "references" section of (Alice Cotter, 2014), "Satie apparently ate only white foods while writing the piece. See Ornella Volta, Satie Seen. Through His Letters (London/New York: Marion Boyars Publishers, 1989)". Cited in (Miller Cotter, Alice. Socrates: Mark Morris on Death and Dying. Dance Research: The Journal of the Society for Dance Research, vol. 32, no. 1, 2014, pp. 1–22. Psychologist Guy (talk) 01:26, 22 January 2020 (UTC)
des moisissures des fruit - yum-yum!
  • There are RS and RS. Those produced in favour of the seriousness or truth of Satie's claims are not specialists. This and this are from specialists who clearly don't take Satie's joke literally. Some of the sources above quoted in favour are clearly uncertain and cautious. I note a variety of translations for "fruit-mould" - what is the French - ok des moisissures des fruit - "mould on fruit". Also disagreement on the colour of the sets of suits, or did he have both grey and yellow sets? No source seems to produce a witness other than Satie himself, for what would surely have been a conspicuous and rather inconvenient trait, if it had been real. Johnbod (talk) 03:20, 22 January 2020 (UTC)
  • I note that the article, as written, says nothing about the content of Memoirs of an Amnesiac, including the scholarly evaluation of it. That might be a good way to work in this material. Mackensen (talk) 03:30, 22 January 2020 (UTC)
  • Anyhow, I restored the "Whiteness" section in the Socrate article, which had been removed for lack of references ([4]), & which I had written many years before, that is: before Wikipedia had an automated system for numbered footnotes [sic] – for clarity: I added a reference now. I like Mackensen's idea to give some more general treatment of Satie's writings, that is, not only one paragraph of his "La Journée du musicien" from the Mémoires d’un amnésique, but for instance also the articles he wrote for Vanity Fair. Currently we only have the list at Erik Satie#Writings, which is a quite meagre treatment of Satie's writings. But, of course, I continue to oppose a treatment that consists of cherry-picking one small aspect of those writings, and then only consider that aspect, quoted out of context, under the narrow (and quite inappropriate) light of what some dietitians have to say about it. --Francis Schonken (talk) 08:54, 22 January 2020 (UTC)
Have you read Ornella Volta's 1989 biography of Satie? I noticed in the content you restored there on the Socrate article, no page numbers were given. If nobody has access to this source, how do we know the content is accurate? Above I listed a peer-reviewed paper from historian Alice Miller Cotton who cited the Volta 1989 biography of Satie, and she suggests the opposite that Satie probably ate white foods to develop one of his compositions. It looks like Volta is actually agreeing with the other sources I provided and not what you are claiming. This is to be taken literally that he did actually consume white foods according to reliable sources provided here. It is not up to us to say if this is true or false, it is what the sources say. Psychologist Guy (talk) 10:04, 22 January 2020 (UTC)
For clarity, Volta's 1989 Satie Seen Through His Letters, ISBN 071452980X, is not a *biography* (Volta's *biography* of Satie was published in English a year earlier, ISBN 9782850255656). Yes, I read it: it lies on my desk now, that is: its Dutch translation, ISBN 90-257-2436-1, for clarity, translated from the English version (except from the quotes from letters, which are translated from French directly). So I give chapter titles rather than page numbers. --Francis Schonken (talk) 10:59, 22 January 2020 (UTC)
Johnbod what is a specialist? Do you mean a qualified historian? Are you saying Steven Shapin is not a specialist? According to his article "American historian and sociologist of science. He is the Franklin L. Ford Research Professor of the History of Science at Harvard University. He is considered one of the earliest scholars on the sociology of scientific knowledge." The Shapin source should obviously be cited on the article because it is reliable. If you have reliable sources saying Erik Satie's white food diet was a "joke", then we can include those as well. Based on what I have seen so far, the mainstream view on this is that Satie did actually eat white foods. The idea that it was all a "joke" is a minority view point and only supported by one historian. Psychologist Guy (talk) 10:21, 22 January 2020 (UTC)
No, Shapin is very clearly not a specialist, on Satie, his period and mileu, music in general, etc. I have given you two quickly-found-by google specialist sources who do think Satie's description in the "Memoirs of an Ammnesiac" (the title is a bit of clue, don't you think?) is a joke. Btw, I imagine the name of one of the "RS" you cite above, Alistair McGowan, means nothing to you. I suggest you read his article. He's very good at what he does, but it isn't the history of music or late 19th-century France. Johnbod (talk) 14:30, 22 January 2020 (UTC)
There is no such thing as a "specialist" on Satie, last time I checked universities around the world are not offering any qualification on that, lol. Shapin is a notable qualified historian, he specializes in history, so that is more than enough. If you want to include your sources on the article to indicate his diet was a joke, go ahead, but there is no reason why we should not also say historians have taken his diet seriously. At least two of Satie's biographers have said he ate white foods. The diet has been taken literally in many RS. You are saying we should ignore all those? I am asking for a single line on the article. Is that really a heavy demand? I rarely use talk-pages, this entire conversation is hilarious. Disagreement over a single line supported by countless reliable sources... made up criteria that one has to be a "specialist" on the person to be included as a source on the article. The comedy continues but I won't be wasting anymore time here. BTW, I never added Alistair McGowan as a source to the article, he wrote an article in The Guardian which is a reliable source, I merely documented it on this talk-page. I noticed you did not comment on the BBC Music Magazine or the Australian Music Examinations Board which take the diet literally. You can read what I added to the article [5], three sources. Cecilia Novero's book Antidiets of the Avant-garde is a work of scholarship and contains a chapter about composers who ate only white foods. Psychologist Guy (talk) 15:08, 22 January 2020 (UTC)
Yes, nor is Sense of Humour Studies offered anywhere, which is a great pity! The BBC Music Magazine or the Australian Music Examinations Board are certainly not sources to use to contradict proper musicologists (now that is a field of study). The article could do with more on Satie's writings, and I would not object to a sensibly-phrased mention of Satie's claimed diet in an expanded section on that. Johnbod (talk) 17:40, 22 January 2020 (UTC)
I just received an email from a reliable historian telling me that Satie's biographer Rollo H. Myers took his white food diet as literal. Myers biography of Satie was published in 1948. It was the first biography published of Satie in English. I have not read Ornella Volta's biography but as outlined above, she seemed to think the same thing that he did eat white foods to develop one of his compositions. Psychologist Guy (talk) 10:28, 22 January 2020 (UTC)
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