Satie - Gnossiennes

Satie is one of the most curious composers out there, but nothing can dim the charm of his beautiful Gnossiennes for solo piano.

Erik Satie was a French composer and pianist, who would, without doubt, come top of any list of eccentric composers. Satie's coining of the word 'gnossienne' was one of the rare occasions when a composer used a new term to indicate a new type of composition. The Six Gnossiennes served to cement Satie's status as the musical pin-up boy of Bohemian Paris in the late nineteenth century.

They are by no means his most famous works, but there's much to recommend these curios - they share with his Gymnopedies a sense of the otherworldly (though they're not quite as tranquil), and the first one in particular is often heard on television and in films, a perfect underscore to any curious on-screen happenings.