My daughter Eileen is the most musical one and is a mean hand at the piano, when she is in the right form.
The tune she most enjoys playing is one of Eric Satie’s Gymnopédie.
This is a most magical piece of music, one that people unfamilar with the name Satie will know because of its light etherial touch has been used in countless movies and even advertisments.
Satie resisted calling his musical pieces by the usual names of the time; mazurkas or waltzes like Chopin had, but instead called them gnossienne – a word which seems to come from the gnostic sect to which Satie was a member – and, as in the above, gymnopédie, which has an even more interesting background.
Wikepedia tells us:
The Gymnopaedia, in ancient Sparta, was a yearly celebration during which naked youths displayed their athletic and martial skills through the medium of dancing.

I really don’t feel that this music had much to do with young men dancing, particularly not the Spartans who were surely made of stronger stuff but, if you click on to this link you can make up your own mind.

This has all arisen because my assignment for tonight’s French class is to give a short talk about a French composer and play an example of his work-on a CD player I should add!
Thanks Eileen!