L'Histoire du soldat
Histoire du soldat, or Tale of the Soldier (as it was first published),[1] is an hour-long 1918 theatrical work to be "read, played and danced (lue, jouée et dansée)" by three actors, one or more dancers, and a septet of instruments. Its music is by Igor Stravinsky, its libretto, in French, by Swiss writer Charles Ferdinand Ramuz; the two men conceived it together, their basis being the Russian tale The Runaway Soldier and the Devil in the collection of Alexander Afanasyev.[2]
"The Soldier's Tale" redirects here. For the unrelated 1988 movie, see A Soldier's Tale.Music[edit]
Histoire du soldat is scored for clarinet, bassoon, cornet (often played on trumpet), trombone, percussion, violin and double bass. The music is rife with changing time-signatures and for this reason is commonly, though not always, performed with a conductor.
Roles[edit]
Ramuz relates the parable of a soldier who trades his violin to the Devil in return for vast economic gain by means of three actors: the Narrator, who both narrates and impersonates several minor characters; the Devil, who assumes various guises; and the Soldier himself, Joseph, from no army identified. A dancer has the usually silent role of the Princess.
First performances[edit]
Stravinsky was helped greatly in the work's production by Swiss philanthropist Werner Reinhart, who sponsored and underwrote its premiere. In gratitude Stravinsky dedicated Histoire to him,[3] and gave him the manuscript.[4][5]
Histoire du soldat was first performed on 28 September 1918 in Lausanne, conducted by Ernest Ansermet. British conductor Edward Clark, a friend and champion of Stravinsky and a former assistant to Ansermet at the Ballets Russes, led the British premiere in 1926 in Newcastle upon Tyne and gave three fully staged performances in London the following July.[6]
Suites[edit]
Reinhart continued his support of Stravinsky's work in 1919 by funding a series of concerts of his recent chamber music.[7] These included a suite of five numbers from Histoire du soldat arranged for clarinet, violin and piano, in a nod to Reinhart who was an amateur clarinetist.[8] This was first performed on 8 November 1919, also in Lausanne, long before a larger suite employing all seven original instruments became available to other musicians.[9]
Translations into English and German[edit]
The original French text by Ramuz has been translated into English by Michael Flanders and Kitty Black, and into German by the poet Hans Reinhart.[10]
Musical influences[edit]
Histoire du soldat shows Stravinsky's absorption of a wide range of musical influences: the pasodoble in the Marche royale; the tango, the waltz and ragtime, as played by Joseph to cure the Princess; klezmer in the instrumentation and textures; Luther's Ein feste Burg in the Petit choral; and Bach in the Grand choral. According to the musicologist Danick Trottier, these influences are linked to a certain extent to Stravinsky's experiences and first successes in the cosmopolitan Paris of the early 1910s, since the capital of France was a confluence-point for a variety of artists and musicians during La Belle Époque.[11]
Notes
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