If we had to name just one piece that captures the identity of the Apaches of the early 20th century, it would be this one. Stravinsky's The Soldier's Tale encapsulates all the concerns of Parisian artists of the Belle Époque: artistic crossovers, inspiration from music from elsewhere, experimentation with form and genre... A meeting place for musicians and artists from diverse backgrounds, Paris was also the city where Igor Stravinsky enjoyed his first successes, surrounded by his Apache friends Maurice Ravel, Tristan Klingsor, Florent Schmitt, Léon-Paul Fargue and many others. It was in this artistic effervescence that he developed his personal language, all the components of which can be found in The Soldier's Tale. 
 
Ragtime, Paso Doble, Bach-style chorales, klezmer music... This variety of influences serves a Faustian theme: a soldier sells his soul to the Devil in exchange for a book that allows him to predict the future. A universal tale, inspired by the Russian author Afanassiev, which ends in hell for the soldier. 

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Julien Masmondet and Les Apaches d'aujourd'hui have decided to pay tribute to their elders by reviving this play alongside Didier Sandre of the Comédie-Française, in a concert version for a single narrator who plays the roles of narrator, soldier and devil, accompanied by seven solo musicians. The adaptation was created by Didier Sandre, whose long association with the work has enabled him to tighten up the drama, giving it a profound unity and bringing out all the musicality of the text.

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To introduce L'Histoire du Soldat, an original creation for percussion and electronics commissioned from Othman Louati, immediately plunges the listener into the world of rhythm, which, in the form of a march, becomes like a second heartbeat that punctuates every scene and accompanies us step by step until the last bar of the work. 

Electronic music is the music of the invisible: the instrumental gesture is forever erased in the beyond of the sounds emitted. No doubt the devil is already hiding there, long before the violin is exchanged for him. He is biding his time. He already sees everything: the weary path, the sorrows, the games, the pleasures, the vanity. Stravinsky entrusts the race to the abyss to the furious horses of percussion. In this prologue for Julien Masmondet's Apaches, the percussionist becomes the prophet of exile: he knows that he will lead the unfortunate soldier to the confines of darkness; a pythia with beating drums, he will sound the sacrifices and visions of the terrible steppes.

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