La Grand-Combe: A really, really hot coal!

Fire, flames, explosions… At the Ricard well, the Tout en vrac company let the gunpowder speak. A theatrical proposal completed the success of this Sainte-Barbe 2024 edition. Midi Libre – MiKAEL ANISSET

Mixing theater and pyrotechnics, the musical stroll provided on Saturday, December 7 by the Tout en vrac Company, uniting nearly a thousand people at the foot of the Ricard well, caused a sensation.

Perhaps never have so many flames and explosions accompanied the celebrations of the traditional Sainte-Barbe festival in La Grand-Combe. And this saint of fire, patron saint of miners, not only warmed the hearts of the spectators, about a thousand, she also fueled the hearth of the creation of the Tout en vrac company. Directed by Nicolas Granier, the troupe, the musicians of the group La Clate and then the pyrotechnicians literally made the gunpowder speak for the delight of a crowd stunned by the pyrotechnic power. Just as much as by the delirium of the theatrical sequence that opened the evening on Place Frida-Khalo. From 5:30 p.m., after a light cold rain reminded us of the bite of the approaching winter, three actors, perched on a decapitated car, invite us on a journey. But not just any journey: the ultimate one! That of abandoning the old world, consumerist, individualistic, stupefying, for a new world. On a float, a guru dressed all in white, bell-bottoms, Elouan Hardy, calls, to do this, for a purification by fire.

The enlightened ones, including the great master played by Elouan Hardy, will fail to project a sacrificed public into the abyss of an ancient world. Midi Libre – MiKAEL ANISSET

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A flower-man, a shaman with a prophetic tone played by Jonah Mouz-Cazenave, proposes the path to transcendence while Lumière du monde, an elf played by Nicole Choukroune swinging above the threats that threaten the world, invites us to calm our ardor by questioning the relevance of a collective sacrifice to mark the advent of the new world. Thus the old world is dying and, of course, the new world is slow to appear, prophesied Gramsci, but, for Charlotte Meurisse, director, “these fanatics want to destroy everything, but we want to tell that the passage to the world of tomorrow, which will happen, must be done through mourning for what it has been rather than through destruction…”
At the end of the stroll at the foot of the Ricard well, the red-lit headframe glows in the white light of a half-moon in the heart of a clear sky. Then the doors of tomorrow's world open wide!

A modern-day mountaineer, emerging from the lair of the well, his ascent from a Jaw harp spitting flames and molten steel has left its mark on people's minds. Midi Libre – MiKAEL ANISSET

From there emerges the symbol of the century: the car! And everything changes… A modern-day mountaineer, extracting himself from the chaos of a Jaw harp spewing liquid steel, rises into the air as our new consciences would be in the world of tomorrow. Then comes the sacrifice of the artifact of this world that is ending. And since Tout en vrac wouldn’t be tout en vrac without fire, as Noémie points out, a “fire punk” whose leather helmet bristling with burners vibrates with blue-tinged flames, well it explodes!!!
Dry, heavy, powerful, almost excessive. The hot coal from the Grand-Combe, an ore with an unrivaled combustion quality at the time, makes this country shine in the heart of the night. The audience, men, women and children, are left speechless while the La Clate orchestra rages with notes and percussion… “It was magical”, exclaims a first spectator at the moment of silence. “Spectacular,” Nelly continues, . With the well under fire, it was splendid.” “Unbelievable, concluded the teenage Noelly. Everything, the music, the car, the fire.”
Old or new, what does it matter! That evening, the gaiety of this great-how-much world lit the way home…