The world is not
short of recommendable recordings of Carmina Burana even
at budget price, which means that Naxos’s entrant has high standards
to maintain. And in many respects it does. The engineering is
generally first class and the performers – all of them – are
caught with immediacy. The incisive men’s voices are finely
calibrated, and the brass cuts through splendidly in Fortune
plango vulnera, though here the lower strings do sound just
a touch muddy. Ecce gratum ends I Primo vere with
rousing declamation and when Alsop needs to bring out the heavy
guns, as here, they are duly brought out.
The girls and women
sing graciously in Chramer, gip die varwe mir augmenting
the fine orchestral contribution here and elsewhere. They’re
attentive in the quieter passages especially and the brass and
percussion sections prove strong and assertive in Uf dem
anger – with a particularly combustible conclusion to the
section. Major responsibilities fall on the soloists. Baritone
Markus Eiche is bluffly convincing, full of well-characterised
vocalism; the voice is excellently scaled and malleable within
its compass. If one has criticisms they centre on the unconvincing
head voice in Dies, nox et omnia. Tenor Tom Randle’s
delivery is idiosyncratic and won’t be to all tastes; best to
sample his way with In Taberna. Of course the tenor is
pushed high and sometimes punishingly so but higher up his voice
has a strange kind of “halo” around it. Which leaves the soprano
Claire Rutter, whose opening statements in the third section
Cour d’amours are most impressive – she floats Stetit
puella very nicely indeed.
There are plenty
of recommendable versions at tempting price. Two of my own favourites
are the famous DG Jochum and the less famous Leitner, now reissued
on Arts. The former is the more generally recommendable but
the latter has virtues of its own, and the recording was supervised
by Orff, though there are still concerns over the 1974 sound
which is a bit flabby. In view of this the Jochum still holds
sway.
Jonathan Woolf
Claire Rutter
(soprano) 
