Customer Reviews
1/10 - By: MB, 02 Oct 2008 
I have recently purchased this CD & am very sad to hear that the Gymnopedies has some background noise that sounds for all the world like someone ice skating to it. I will be returning this CD to Amazon as I wanted to hear great piano music, not T & D.
I love this piece of music & will probably burn one of my old LPs onto a CD.
2 Stars because Aldo Ciccolini is a great pianist, but the background noise just ruins it for me.
MB
SUCCULENT AND SUNDRY SATIE - By: Melvyn M. Sobel, 19 Jul 2005 
This attractive & attuned Satie compilation from Tacchino, spanning the composer's eclectic career, rewards the listener with some of the most finely etched, sensitive & charming playing available. The popular Trois Gymnopedies [1888] offers just the right balance of sustained, nostalgic melancholy, & the wonderful Six Gnossiennes [1890-99], a mixture of mystery (Nos. 1-4), beauty (particularly No. 5) & perturbation (most ostensibly No. 6). The clever Sonatine Bureaucratique [1917] is tweaked by Tacchino to smack even more cleverly of a latter-day Scarlatti or, perhaps, Clementi, each note a pearly, articulated gem; & the lyrically inviting Valse ("Je Te Veux"), a real find, is memorable at every turn. The Veritables Preludes Flasques [1912], Croquis Et Agaceries D'Un Gros Bonhomme En Bois [1913], & Les Trios Valses Distinguees [1914] are contagiously quirky & moodyin their unique brevity, the appeal of which Tacchino hones with a secure combination of wit & eloquence. All stops are pulled, though, when the pianist tackles the outrageously irreverent Sports Et Divertissements [1914], arriving at the conclusion of his recital. These "snippets," whose lengths vary from a mere sixteen seconds ("La Chasse") to a tad over a minute ("Le Tango"), are pure Satie, nose-sniffing pokes at the musical establishment, the world, & lifein general, & even when appearing serious (asin the opening "Choral inappetissant"), are never, ever such.
[Running time: 57:46]
