Carmina Burana
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This is one of the certifiable hits of 20th-century music, a rarity given that it’s a choral work. (In his program notes Phillip Huscher observes that 25 CD versions are listed in the Schwann catalog, as good a gauge of popularity as anything.) Something in this music grabs the listener and will not let go. The first time I heard it I was ten years old, idly half listening to a local classical radio station in Kansas City. I didn’t hear the name of the composer or of the work, and I listened in vain for it for the next few years. When I finally found it I bought a copy and proceeded to memorize it. I can think of few pieces of music that have affected me in such a visceral way: the big numbers giving place to sweet, quiet songs, the juxtaposition of very modern settings and medieval words and sentiments, the driving rhythms that stick in the brain, the sound of massed voices singing exacting music exactly. Not many pieces of music approach the accomplishment of Carmina Burana; even Orff never really recaptured its success, though he never strayed from its basic formula.
One reason for its success is the way Orff uses instruments, among which one would have to include the human voice. The orchestration amounts to a full-employment program for percussionists–multiple timpani, cymbals, a big bass drum, a xylophone, a celeste, two grand pianos. (You know things are approaching the fortissimo level when you see two pianists banging away on grand pianos with the tops up, clearly feeling but not really hearing them.) There’s also plenty of brass as well as a large chorus, a children’s chorus, and a trio of soloists. When they’re all going they make a noble noise indeed. This is a work that loses from being played quietly on a home stereo.
The soloists sometimes seem almost like an afterthought, but two of the three assembled here were very good. Tenor Frank Lopardo, who’s familiar to audiences at the opera house, was making his CSO debut. The tenor gets to sing only the vocally unrewarding (yet very funny) song of the roasted swan, but Lopardo’s appropriately glum acting and robust singing were a small treasure. Danish baritone Boje Skovhus, also making his first appearance with the orchestra, was a find, his voice snarling or limpid as the words required.
