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Ask a pianist to name a Satie piece and you'll get the same answer nearly every time: Gymnopédie No. 1, the slow D major waltz used in a thousand films and playlists. It's a lovely piece — free to play in our library at difficulty 3 of 9 on PracticeClef's published 1–9 scale — but it's one piece out of a stranger, funnier catalog. As of this batch, every playable engraving of Satie's vocal music in our source corpus is live too: cabaret songs, an oratorio on the death of Socrates, and a last set of miniatures, all sitting next to the piece everyone already knows.
The Montmartre cabaret songs
Before Satie was a modernist household name, he was a working pianist at the Chat Noir and other Montmartre cabarets, churning out waltzes and comic songs to pay rent. Je te veux is the biggest of these — probably Satie's most-searched song title after the Gymnopédies. These are the piano parts of his songs — self-contained accompaniment repertoire, not the vocal line — and the set runs from difficulty 4 to 6.
Je te veux (piano part)
This piece is in C major, sits at level 4 of 9, and takes about 3 minutes to play.
A slow, sentimental waltz written for the singer Paulette Darty around 1897–1902 — a good entry point if the Gymnopédies are the only Satie you've played.
Open this score when you want to play it.
La diva de “L’Empire” (piano part)
This piece is in G major, sits at level 6 of 9, and takes about 2 minutes to play.
A music-hall march-song for Paulette Darty's Empire-theatre act — the densest piece in the cabaret set.
Open this score when you want to play it.
Chez le docteur (piano part)
This piece is in C major, sits at level 5 of 9, and takes about 41 seconds to play.
A brief comic sketch — a visit to the doctor set to music — short enough to sight-read in one pass.
Open this score when you want to play it.
Two more from the same world round out the set. Tendrement is an A-flat-major piece at level 6 of 9 and takes about three minutes; L'omnibus automobile, Satie's ode to Paris's first motorbus line, is in B-flat major at level 5 and takes about 30 seconds. Both are live now.
Socrate: the minimalism precursor
In 1918, Satie set excerpts of Plato's dialogues on the death of Socrates as a “drame symphonique,” premiered privately at the Princesse de Polignac's salon — spare, repetitive music that's widely read as an early ancestor of minimalism (John Cage was an admirer). The three movements are longer and more absorbing than anything else in this batch.
Portrait de Socrate (piano part)
This piece is in F# minor, sits at level 5 of 9, and takes about 4 minutes to play.
The opening movement, built on a sustained drone and a deliberately unresolved final chord.
Open this score when you want to play it.
Mort de Socrate (piano part)
This piece is in A minor, sits at level 5 of 9, and takes about 12 minutes to play.
The closing movement and by far the longest piece in this batch — a slow, unhurried setting of Socrates's death scene from the Phaedo.
Open this score when you want to play it.
The middle movement, Bords de l'Ilissus, is in D major at level 4 of 9 and takes about six minutes. It is also live, completing the set.
Ludions: five last miniatures
Satie's final song set, composed in 1923 to poems by Léon-Paul Fargue and published posthumously in 1926, is five tiny character sketches — each under a minute, none difficult to sight-read, all dryly funny.
Air du rat (piano part)
This piece is in G major, sits at level 4 of 9, and takes about 30 seconds to play.
A rat's aria — brisk and light, one of the lowest-difficulty pieces in this batch.
Open this score when you want to play it.
Chanson du chat (piano part)
This piece is in Bb major, sits at level 5 of 9, and takes about 30 seconds to play.
The cat's answer to the rat's aria — a miniature pair worth practicing back to back.
Open this score when you want to play it.
The other three Ludions songs are live as well. All three sit at level 5 of 9: the E-flat-major Spleen and F-minor Air du poète each take about 30 seconds; the A-flat-major La grenouille américaine takes about 53 seconds.
What “complete” means here
This batch also adds four early, stand-alone songs. The set begins with the F-major Elégie at level 2, the easiest piece here, then moves through Adieu in B-flat major at level 3 and the D-major Danseuse at level 4 to Chanson, also in D major, at level 5. That makes for 17 new pieces plus Gymnopédie No. 1, 18 Satie pieces live on PracticeClef. “Complete” means every playable engraving in our source corpus, not literally every piece Satie ever composed; see the full set on his composer page.
Explore it
All of this is free to browse in the full library — connect a digital piano for live note feedback. Turn on Wait mode when you want the cursor to advance after you play the written notes. If the Gymnopédies brought you here, the cabaret songs are the easiest next step; if you want something more substantial, Mort de Socrate is the deep end of this batch.
A note on the numbers. Every key, difficulty grade, and duration in this post comes from each piece's own metadata record on PracticeClef, and duration figures are score-derived estimates, not measured performance times. Difficulty is PracticeClef's published 1–9 scale. Pieces labeled “piano part” are the accompaniment to a voice-and-piano song — the vocal line is not included.