Embryons desséchés

Embryons desséchés ("Desiccated embryos") is a piano composition by Erik Satie, composed in the summer of 1913. The composition consists of three little "movements", each taking about two to three minutes to play.

The parts of the composition are:

1. (Desiccated embryo) of a Holothurian (30 June 1913), dedicated to Suzanne Roux:

2. (Desiccated embryo) of an Edriophthalma (1 July 1913), dedicated to Edouard Dreyfus:

3. (Desiccated embryo) of a Podophthalma (4 July 1913), dedicated to Jane Mortier:

Composer/conductor Friedrich Cerha orchestrated Embryons desséchés for a 1970 recording of Satie's orchestral music (CE 31018) by his ensemble, "Die Reihe." This performance of Embryons desséchés features an actress reciting the narratives from Satie's original score synchronously with the music, even though the composer disapproved of such a practice.

In the 20th century both Edriophthalma and Podophthalmia would become classified in the Malacostraca class of the Crustacea subphylum of the Arthropoda phylum; the use of the terms Edriophthalma and Podophthalmia became obsolete with regard to the taxonomy of crustaceans.

As to the sources Satie might have had to make references to Podophthalmia and Edriophthalmata: in early evolutionary biology these crustaceans (and notably also their embryos) were studied by Fritz Müller, in his book Facts and Arguments for Darwin, published in German in 1863, and available in English in 1869. The images below are taken from the Project Gutenberg publication of that book (E-text N° 6475):

The book also shows other development stages of these animals (zoea, larva), even odder in shape.