Some say that the French composer Erik Satie was the inventor of what's now known as "muzak." He wrote pieces that he called "furniture music" allegedly after hearing Henri Matisse "express a desire for some kind of art form without any nagging subject matter." "Forged Iron Tapestry" was to be played as guests arrived in the foyer; "Phonic Floor Tiles" was intended for lunchtime or marriage proposals. Satie's furniture music was created to fill up awkward silences in conversation, neutralize the sound of silverware and traffic, and generally create the sensation of an easy chair. Satie's pieces are composed of fragmented, repeated phrases, that imitate the pattern of wallpaper and that are not intended to attract attention in any way. At the debut of his concept, held at a music hall, Satie became infuriated when the audience refused to stop listening: he "leaped into the crowd and implored everyone to talk, make noise, or concentrate on the picture exhibition in the theater hall."
Satie's music, even his non-furniture music, is good to read to. His rebellion against Wagnerian "excess" led him to plainsong and chant, and his music shows a similar interest in abandoning "dramatic accents" in order to create music that "sounded remote enough to make people more cognizant... of their surroundings." A lot of Satie's music is always moving forwards-- like all music, except music played backward-- but it doesn't ever reach anything that startles us out of our reading.
"Furnishing music completes one's property." -Erik Satie
A great source: Elevator Music by Joseph Lanza (on Google Books!)
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