Orff: Carmina Burana

Orff: Carmina Burana

Every concert-season programmer can depend on <i>Carmina Burana</i> to bring down the house. Since its premiere in 1937, Carl Orff's theatrically vivid, earthy cantata setting of the medieval poetry of wandering minstrels has kept its extraordinarily popular status. Christian Thielemann's new recording by no means displaces the classic accounts by Jochum or Ormandy, but it dusts off many of the clichés that have gathered around <i>Carmina</i> and conveys an overarching, coherent vision that is frequently lacking in performance. Thielemann brings this triptych of scenes to life--springtime, the tavern, and the court of love--with an understanding of pleasure and pain as opposites of the same coin in each, so that the framing chorus to "Fortune, Empress of the World" carries tremendous weight. Contrasts between Orff's exuberant, Stravinsky-derived rhythmic vigor and the score's more introspective moments are favored, with subtle adjustments of tempo along the way. Rich percussive details as well as the choral body itself are sometimes obscured in the recorded sound (not nearly so bright or forward as in Previn's fine 1975 account), but one of this disc's great assets is its trio of soloists, including a fantastically expressive baritone in Simon Keenlyside and a ravishing portrayal by Christiane Oelze of the young girl in the tunic who comes to discover love. Thielemann allows them ample freedom to shape their phrases with the most varied meaning. This performance isn't interested solely in pumping up your metabolism, but in searing your heart as well. <i>--Thomas May</i>