Bonus - The King of Beans Breaks Out the Heavy Artillery / Tulip Princess Variations.

Two Satie Obsessions

A few years ago the Facebook group Satie Obsessions had a composition “contest” for pieces based upon one of Erik Satie’s five finger pieces for children. I submitted two pieces. Neither of them won. Decided I might as well throw them out to an even narrower audience than that Facebook group, but since these aren’t technically lead sheet tunes nor were they composed as part of that particular regime, and, further, these were set in Finale, not easyABC, I decided to post these as a bonus.

Satie composed several sets of five finger pieces supposedly for children and he’s one of the only composers I know of that was able to create true art with such extreme limitations. In my opinion the compositions are more about children and childhood than they are for children.

This first piece was based upon his War Song of the King of Beans. I think my insistence on mixing double sharps and double flats didn’t help this one, though Satie loved to play around with accidentals.

The other piece I submitted was based upon a charming little piece What The Tulip Princess Says. I turned it into an exercise for one hand and kept the melody pretty much intact for this one. I thought it was a nice contrast to my other submission and was more disappointed when it didn’t make the cut than I was when the King of Beans lost.

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