It was between 1900 and 1930 that Ravel composed these works; from the Menuet Antique right up to La Valse, Europe, and indeed the world, are full of frenzy, acceleration, fury and finally explosion. Did this monstrous machine ever stop? It was at the end of 2015, that Hélène Tysman recorded this disc, and two phrases in particular which inspired her for this programme still resonate: the quotation of Henri de Régnier, highlighting the Valses Nobles et sentimentales, who talks of "the delicious and ongoing pleasure of a useless occupation", and the exchanges between two aristocrats, present at a soirée preceding the 1830 revolution, who observe; "we are dancing on a volcano", a phrase which would inspire Jean Renoir for La règle du jeu in 1939.