Erik Satie

Nocturnes

With the five Nocturnes, composed in 1919, Satie concluded the series of cyclically conceived piano works that form the backbone of his oeuvre, so to speak. The pieces of the same name by John Field and Frédéric Chopin served him as models, from which he adopted not only the romantic, dreamy tone, but also the three-part form and the swaying movement. The harmony, on the other hand, is entirely his own, which he designed according to a system of his own devising. Satie said about his Nocturnes: 'This is another expression of mine', and indeed the pieces, which are not difficult to play, seem unusually serious - far from nonsense, parody or cabaret, which, as is well known, otherwise characterize large parts of his complete works.

Original text edition, paperback