Orff explored the poetry
of Catullus and Sappho in these two
parts of his Trionfi, of which the first
part was Carmina Burana. It was the
Roman setting of Catulli Carmina
that led him to delve further and a
reading of Sophocles crystallised the
ambition to set the poems and fragments
of Sappho. The results here are overwhelmingly
authoritative, not solely inasmuch as
they have the composer’s imprimatur,
but rather because they sound so fresh
and idiomatic. Though I ought to say
at the outset that those, like Churchill
and Shakespeare, blessed with little
Greek or Latin are going to find this
release something of a catastrophe –
there are no texts and summaries are
no substitute. We need to see how Orff
adapted his musical expression to the
very particular demands that these very
different poetic traditions embody.
That said, and it’s
a big caveat, we can still admire the
dramatic unity Orff evokes, the sense
of interjectory and conversational ellipsis,
and those moments of poignant unaccompanied
recitation that add so much of a sense
of intimacy to the scores, especially
the Catullus. The Chants – sample Vivamus
mea Lesbia – are brisk and fluent,
the chorus sounding notably well drilled
and we also get the chance to listen
the women of the Cologne Radio Choir
in their velvet soft Jucundum mea
vite. The scoring is correspondingly
light – solo pianos and percussion.
Trionfo di Afrodite
followed in 1950-51. Full of ostinati
and melismas this is scored for fuller
orchestral forces and generates its
effect through a kind of hypnotic oscillatory
repetition. The melismas soar ever upwards
(Sposa e Sposo, Part III) and the choir
and soloists cope heroically with the
sometimes ungrateful writing; throughout
in fact the soloists and especially
Leitner are tremendously involved and
involving. The restoration sounds first
class.
Jonathan Woolf
Carl
ORFF (1895-1982) Carmina
Burana (1935-36) 
Ruth-Margaret Pütz (soprano) Michael
Cousins (tenor) Barry McDaniel (baritone)
Roland Hermann (bass) Cologne Radio
Choir Tölzer Childrens Choir Cologne
Radio Symphony Orchestra/Ferdinand Leitner
Recorded by West German Radio, Cologne,
1973
ARTS 43001-2
[60.29][JW]
One
can see why this ceded ground to the
Jochum but it does have attractions
of its own ... see Full
Review
Carl
ORFF
(1895-1982) Catulli
Carmina (1943) Donald Grobe
(tenor) – Catallus Ruth-Margaret Pütz
(soprano) - Lesbia Trionfo di
Afrodite (1950-51) Enriqueta
Tarrés (soprano) – Sposa Donald
Grobe (tenor) – Sposo Hans Günter
Nöcker (bass) – Corifeo Brigitte
Dürrler (soprano) – Corifea Horst
R Laubenthal (tenor) – Corifeo
Cologne Radio Choir Cologne Radio Symphony
Orchestra/Ferdinand Leitner Recorded
Cologne, 1974
ARTS ARCHIVES 43002-2 [75.00] [JW]
Tremendously
involved and involving. The restoration
sounds first class. ... see Full
Review
Carl
ORFF
(1895-1982) Orpheus
– free adaptation of Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo
(1923) Carl Orff (speaker) Hermann Prey
(bass baritone) – Orpheus Lucia Popp
(soprano) – Eurydice Rose Wagemann (mezzo
soprano) – Die Botin Karl Ridderbusch
(bass) – Der Wächter der Toten
Choir of Bavarian Radio Munich Radio
Orchestra/Kurt Eichhorn Recorded Munich,
1972
ARTS ARCHIVES 43003-2 [66.07] [JW]
A
curio that will be of most interest
to devotees of the development of Orff’s
vocal and theatrical powers. ... see
Full Review
