CARMINA BURANA by Carl Orff, Odeon of Herodes Atticus, 2 October 2024

Orchestra, Choir and Ballet of the National Opera of Odessa
Music Director: Chernetski Igor
Choir Conductor: Gazinskiy Ivan
Choreography: Mosterd Gerard

The most famous symphonic-choral work of the 20th century, Carmina Burana by the German composer and music educator Carl Orff, is presented at the Herodeion by the National Opera of Odessa with the participation of 150 performers.

The basis of the stage cantata "Carmina Burana" (1936 - 1937) by Carl Orff was 24 poems from the eponymous collection of medieval poetry. The name "Carmina Burana" in Latin means "Songs of Boyern" and corresponds to the name of the original manuscript "Codex Buranus", which was found in 1803 in the Benedictine monastery of Boyern.

The song and orchestral numbers, juxtaposed against each other, represent a variety of images of the world and speak of the role of Fortune in human life, of the coming and beauties of Spring, of the madness of worldly entertainment and, often bluntly, the graces of love... The main philosophical core of the cantata became a reflection on the fact that a person, with all his small joys and sorrows, is just a toy in the hands of a capricious fate, a symbol of transience, which is its ever-turning Wheel Luck.

"Fortune's wheel shall not tire of turning: I shall be cast down from the heights, humiliated. In the meantime, the other will rise, awake, still lifted high by the same wheel"

Carl Orff imagined a new work - stage, with a constant change of bright contrasting images, with a singing and dancing choir. And the same evening, he sketched the chorus "I mourn the wounds that fate has inflicted on me", and the next day, in the morning, he wrote another chorus - "Dear wishful spring". The composition of the music proceeded very quickly, taking only a few weeks, and by early June 1934 "Carmina Burana" was ready.

The composer played it on the piano for his publishers and they were delighted with the music. However, work on the score was completed only 2 years later, in August 1936. The medieval collection "Carmina Buran" contains more than 250 texts. Their authors are famous poets and monks, students and students who wandered from city to city, from country to country (in Latin they were called vagabonds) and wrote in various languages ​​- medieval Latin, ancient German, old French.

Carl Orff considered their use as a means of "recalling the soul of the old worlds, whose language was an expression of their spiritual content." He was particularly concerned with "the exciting rhythm and picturesqueness of the poems, the singing and unique brevity of the Latin." The composer chose 24 texts of different lengths – from one line to several stanzas, different in genre and content. Spring dances, songs about love - wonderful, shy and frankly sensual, table songs, satirical, philosophical and free-thinking make up the prologue entitled "Fortune - the mistress of the world" and 3 parts: "at the beginning of spring", "the pub', 'Crisis of Love'.

Carmina Burana is a musical work that has captivated musical audiences around the world for nearly a century. Carl Orff's music is immediate and genius, creating images and emotions that touch on timeless themes of human nature and existence that will never stop questioning and evolving.

Music: Carl Orff

Orchestra of the National Opera of Odessa
Choir of the National Opera of Odessa
Ballet of the National Opera of Odessa
Music Director: Chernetski Igor
Choir Conductor: Gazinskiy Ivan
Choir leader: Regrut Valery
Choreography: Mosterd Gerard
Music direction - Production: Chernukho-Volich Vyacheslav
Directed by Mosterd Gerard
Choreography: Mosterd Gerard
Assistant Choreographer: Julia Mitomi
Stages: Stephen Demedts
Costumes: Avondts Nancy
Video and visual projections: Sibe Kokke
Children's choir director: Garbuz Larisa

DURATION: 70 MINUTES