Looks like some people are having a disagreement on Orff's Carmina Burana.I was pointed to it by this post. Here's a sample from the offending article:
If I could grab hold of a piece of music and give it a life-ending chuck, I'd choose "Carmina Burana." Why? Because its music is longwinded and repetitive, its mood is maudlin and manipulative, its view of life is (overly) sentimental and tragic. The Nazis loved it, too. Sure, "Tristan and Isolde" (heh) has some of the same qualities, but the music is way better.Here's a sample of the response:
One critic would have it that Carmina is "toxic" music that will make Nazis of all who succumb to its primitive charms. A more idiot notion can hardly be imagined, and no more attention should be paid it than should be paid the notion that one who is not master of his domain, to borrow the Seinfeldian locution, will go blind as consequence. And so what if Orff himself was a Nazi as has been alleged. If true, that's Orff's reputation's problem, not [ours] or yours--or Carmina's.
4 comments:
There are some pieces which are a lot more rewarding to listen to than to perform (e.g. Arvo Pärt), and other pieces which are more fun to sing than they are to listen to, and Carmina Burana fits squarely in the second category.
First of all, Carl Orff was NOT a nazi--He stayed in Germany because he had been slaving away at a new system of musical education for German School children and when the intellectuals started hitting the road he decided someone should stay behind to make sure school kids still had music even though their government was trying to take over the world.
The perception that he was a nazi because he stayed caused him a LOT of hardship in his last years. Carmina was a sensation in Europe almost immediately after the war ended, but took an additinal 17 years to get picked up in the U.S. due to this unfair perception of its composer.
I don't mean to be a know-it-all, but this was a Masters thesis of mine.
Ask me anything--ha,ha.
Carl Orff was NOT a nazi--he was branded a nazi because he chose to stay behind when the intellectuals left Germany.
He stayed because he was in the process of revamping the entire German school system and he feared everything would collapse if he left the country with no one to continue the work.
Carmina was a smash throughout Europe immediately after the war ended, but it took another 17 years for it to premier in the U.S. for this precise reason.
Don't mean to be a know-it-all, but it was a Master's thesis of mine.
Ask me anything--ha,ha.
somehow posted two replies--sorry.
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