Prima Facie Records

D'après Satie: Music Towards a Future Past (PFCD294) £12.50/£17.50

Performed by Duncan Honeybourne (piano)

1. Erik Satie – Gnossienne No. 1 (1890)
2. Philip Grange – Knossienne: pas de deux pour le piano
3. Satie – Gnossienne No. 2
4. Frederick Viner – Sarabande
5. Satie – Gnossienne No. 3
6. David Lancaster – Montmartre
7. Sarah Dacey – Dance of the Ombrophobe
8. Nick Williams – L’escalier de Socrate
9. Jenny Jackson – Pye-Dog
10. Satie – Pieces Froides (Cold Pieces) (1897) - Danse de travers No. 1
11. Ewan East – Le seul morceau fallacieux du precieux degoute (The One Disingenuous Piece of a Jaded Dandy)
12. Ruth Lee – Memory Thread
13. James Else – Intrados
14. Satie – Pieces Froides (Cold Pieces) (1897) - Danse de travers No. 2
15. Steve Plews – Chagrins (For Erik Satie)
16. Sarah Thomas – Un Morceau en Forme de Chou de Bruxelles
17. Andrew Hugill – Valse des cure-dents (Waltz of the Toothpicks)
18. William Rhys Meek – Rosa
19. David Power – Around 1890
20. Hayley Jenkins – Une Journee dans la Vie (d’un petit chien)
21. Satie - Gymnopédie No.1 from Trois Gymnopédies (1888)
22. Morag Galloway – Gymnopédie for Beckett
23. Satie - Gymnopédie No.2
24. Simon Hopkins – Vexopedie no.1 (An Ostracised Beetle)
25. Satie - Gymnopédie No.3

Total Time [55:43]

About this album

It is fitting that this centenary disc should frame Satie’s works alongside original music by British composers. Satie himself valued his British heritage (his mother was Scottish) and he warmly supported fellow composers, from Les Six to the École d’Arcueil (until, characteristically, quarrels broke the friendships). What mattered most to him was difference: music that rejected Wagnerian heaviness and sought a lighter, more essential voice; music, as he told Debussy, “without sauerkraut.” This same spirit of difference animates the present collection, offered in homage to a composer whose clarity, wit and strangeness remain as fresh as ever. (Andrew Hugill)

Credits

Recorded at Cosmo Rodeswald Hall, University of Manchester, August 2025.

Duncan Honeybourne enjoys a diverse profile as a pianist and in music education. Commended for his “gripping performances” (The Times), “glittering performances” (International Piano) and “great technical facility and unfailing imagination” (Musical Opinion), Duncan is best known for his interpretations of 20th and 21st century British piano music. Following concerto debuts in 1998 at Symphony Hall, Birmingham, and the National Concert Hall, Dublin, he made recital debuts in London, Dublin, Paris and at international festivals in Belgium and Switzerland. His debut recording was described by Gramophone magazine as “not to be missed by all lovers of English music”, whilst BBC Music Magazine reported: “There are gorgeous things here. Hard to imagine better performances.” Honeybourne has toured extensively in the UK, Ireland and Europe as solo and lecture recitalist, concerto soloist and chamber musician, appearing at many major venues and leading festivals. His solo performances have been frequently broadcast on BBC Radio 3 and more than 20 networks worldwide, including French, Belgian, Austrian, Swiss and German radio, ABC (Australia) and Radio New Zealand. He has premiered over 70 solo piano works written for him by composers including John Joubert, John Casken, Cecilia McDowall and Sadie Harrison, plus the Andrew Downes Piano Concerto at Birmingham Town Hall. Duncan has also revived many forgotten scores by composers of earlier generations and was invited by the BBC to give the world premiere of two rediscovered piano preludes by English romantic composer Susan Spain-Dunk in a live Radio 3 recital from St David’s Hall, Cardiff. Duncan’s extensive discography includes premiere recordings of piano music by Baines, Bainton, Pitfield, Greville Cooke, Christopher Edmunds, Armstrong Gibbs, Walford Davies and Imogen Holst, as well as many contemporary works. Duncan Honeybourne teaches piano at the Royal Academy of Music Junior Academy, is a Lecturer in Performance at the University of Southampton and a Piano Teacher at Sherborne School. He has adjudicated and given masterclasses at conservatoires and universities in the UK and Ireland, and has written and published widely on music and musicians. At home in Dorset he is Founder/Artistic Director of Chamber Music Weymouth.