Satie: Gymnopédies & Gnossiennes cover

Satie: Gymnopédies & Gnossiennes

Composer
Recorded
Released

Jazz pianist Jacques Loussier is perhaps best known for his swinging trio arrangements of music by Johann Sebastian Bach, music that lends itself particularly nicely to that kind of treatment because it tends to be melodically attractive, harmonically complex, and rhythmically quite square – take a Bach melody and swing it, and the results are almost always really fun. But unlike Bach, Eric Satie was a willfully weird composer, and the piano suites he titled Gymnopédies and Gnossiennes are slow, repetitive, and sometimes written in free time, which creates some challenges for putting them into a jazz setting. But Loussier does a fine job here – much of the music may be hard to recognize, but the arrangements are gorgeous; note in particular the busy bass part on the second variation on “Gymnopédie No. 1.”

Rick Anderson

Suggestions
Rain Dogs cover

Rain Dogs

Tom Waits
For Now cover

For Now

Billy Hart, Fred Hersch, Brian Landrus, Drew Gress
Morton Feldman: For John Cage cover

Morton Feldman: For John Cage

Ives Ensemble, John Snijders, Josje Ter Haar
Seven Days Walking cover

Seven Days Walking

Ludovico Einaudi
Playing With The Trio cover

Playing With The Trio

Francy Boland, Jimmy Woode, Kenny Clarke
Brilliant Corners cover

Brilliant Corners

Thelonious Monk