Carmina Burana

jakelm

Anyone have this album/CD?

I know many Orchestras have recorded this composition.

I love the music. I'm looking for opinions on best SQ recording and overal tallent from any Orchestra.



Jake

John K.

Jake, I also enjoy Carmina Burana and own four of them, plus I've listened to about a dozen others that I've borrowed. The best combination of performance and sound in my view is Blomstedt . Also very good and being almost given away at Tower is the Muti . The third one that I'll suggest is Slatkin .

jakelm

Thanks John. Thats the kind of opinion I am looking , I will deffinatly check out the Blomstedt and the Slatkin

Would love to find it on SACD

bobman1235

That song always reminds me of going to Patriots games... they always play it along with a bunch of clips on the big screen right before the players come out.

bikezappa

I have a few CD recordings of Carmina but they are old. Does any one recommend a nasty DVD of a stage production of Carmina? I saw a live performnce in Boston 20 years ago and it was R rated. I was shocked. I thought it was religious singing. Not.

Some Carmina Info below

Carmina Burana
In 1803, a scroll of medieval poems was discovered in the German province of Bavaria among the debris of the secularized monastery of Benedikt-Beuren ("BURANA").

These lyrics, written primarily in Latin, were determined to be the work of renegade monks and wandering poets of the 13th Century. Their words captured a lost world of rebels and dropouts of the medievil clergy: hard lovers, drinkers, on the move, celebrating existence rather than living the meditative, celibate, cloistered life of the monastery.

The poems include the freshness of medieval love lyrics, exuberance of the drinking song, the zest of the sinner's 'confessions', the wild humour of the hymns to gambling and gluttony, the stoic litany to Lady Luck ('Fortuna Imperatrix Mundi') which Orff chose to open and close his score. Sex is also a dominant theme in many of the songs.
The richly gifted poets called themselves 'goliards' (defrocked monks and minstrels). Traditionally they have been identified as 'vagantes' (vagrant students, vagabond monks and minor clerics), and were said to have been 'better known for their rioting, gambling and intemperance than for their scholarship'. Yet whatever their social status, their artistic and technical skill seem to place them among the clerical and academic elite of the age.

In 1935 German composer Carl Orff re-discovered the poems. Impressed with their meaning and rhythm, he composed a cantata utilizing the centuries old verses. He transformed the writings into invocations and profane chants accompanied by numerous instruments and magical representations. These songs ("CARMINA") were divided into three sections: Springtime-the life force renewed; In the Tavern- drinking and gambling: The Court of Love- passion, sensuality. The sections are pervaded and framed by The Wheel of Fortune ("O Fortuna") perpetually turning, perpetually governing the course of man's existence.

The world premiere of Carmina Burana was presented in Frankfurt am Main by the Frankfurt Opera on June 8, 1937, with Bertil Wetzelsberger conducting. The premiere was a big hit and spread to other opera houses. After the second World War it developed into an international triumph. Generally, the work is performed in the concert hall and the 'total theatre' used in the first performance (music words and movement) may not have been duplicated entirely, however there have been many staged performances worldwide.

jakelm

I might check this out...

http://www.amazon.com/Orff-Beethoven-Symphony-Schwanewilms-Orchestra/dp/B0001Z65PS/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/002-8676978-4420061?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1187973608&sr=1-1

John K.

Jake, here's another discussion on Carmina besides the one zap included, and it also includes a brief discography. If you really want SACD, the Runnicles would be the one to get, although I liked the performances on CD that I suggested a bit more. Incidentally, don't overlook the Muti because it's inexpensive; it compares very well with the others.

jakelm

John K. wrote: »

Jake, here's another discussion on Carmina besides the one zap included, and it also includes a brief discography. If you really want SACD, the Runnicles would be the one to get, although I liked the performances on CD that I suggested a bit more. Incidentally, don't overlook the Muti because it's inexpensive; it compares very well with the others.

Thanks JFK