This 1918 collaboration with the French-Swiss writer C. F. Ramuz took place whilst Stravinsky was living in Switzerland, during and after the War. It was based on Russian folk material, but influenced by pasodoble, tango and ragtime, with chorales at its climax. The soldier returning home is thought to reflect Stravinsky's self-imposed exile from his homeland. It is a masterpiece of musical economy born of hard times. Originally the cautionary tale was narrated, and enacted by three actors and a female dancer.
Story telling with puppets is a Russian speciality and a highly developed theatrical skill.
Soldat are given by a 'teacher' puppet, who uses the walls as a blackboard and chalks on a few paragraphs of the original story from time to time. With about five rows of seats, everyone is close enough to see all the detail and to become involved in these imagined creatures, an experience very much like the way that children become immersed in stories. The second half of the Southwark Playhouse programme was, in its own way, almost as delightful - a surprise appearance by the soprano saxophonist Lol Coxhill , one of the true originals of British jazz. Here Coxhill was twinned with Veryan Weston , a pianist with whom he had played in the past, but who was working with him again, apparently without rehearsal, for the first time in several years. Most of his recordings, like the wonderfully titled 'Fleas in Custard', are now unavailable.