La Diva de l'Empire

It was premiered by singer Paulette Darty [fr], dubbed the "Queen of the Slow Waltz",[1] in the musical revue Dévidons la bobine in Paris on July 26, 1904, and published that same year.

John Philip Sousa and his band had introduced the cakewalk to France during their appearance at the 1900 Paris Exposition, but it gained little notoriety there until a danced version was performed in the revue Joyeux nègres (The Happy Negroes) at the Nouveau Cirque in October 1902.

On May 20, 1904, he registered a piano piece called "Stand-Walk" with SACEM that was virtually identical with the keyboard part of "La Diva de l'Empire" except for its key.

[5][6] Its indoor promenades were hotbeds of vice where high-class prostitutes, nicknamed "Daughters of the Empire" by the British press, plied their trade, and were the target of a much-publicized 1894 attempt by social reformers to shut them down.

The Diva is an unnamed star performer at the theatre, who dresses like a little girl (complete with a "big Greenaway hat") and acts like one until she coyly lifts her skirts to reveal her "quivering" legs.

[11][12] Satie's cabaret songs of the early 1900s were products of an unhappy period in his life, when he was unsure of his musical direction and poverty compelled him to write what he called "rudes saloperies" ("crude shit") to make a living.

[5] They had important repercussions, on his own subsequent development and for other French composers (notably Les Six) who would find inspiration in popular music.

Into a single "Yes" she puts such sweetness, That all the snobs in waistcoats Welcome her with frenzied hurrahs, Toss bunches of flowers on the stage, Without observing the sly smile On her pretty face.