The war cello

Concert reading based on the war diaries of Maurice Maréchal.

Music by Bach, Britten, Henze, Amoyel, Durosoir, Debussy…

Emmanuelle Bertrand pays tribute to the illustrious ‘grandfather of the cello’, Maurice Maréchal, by telling the unusual story of his wartime cello known as ‘le Poilu’.

Made during the war in the Trenches, this cello was carved out of German ammunition boxes and has a sound close to that of an antique cello! Reproduced identically by luthier Jean-Louis Prochasson, the miraculous sound of this instrument emerges from the past to share with us, in music and text, the correspondence of a soldier with the great artists of the time.