Mitch Friedfeld <[log in to unmask]> writes:

>The composer has apparently never heard of subtlety.  He had political
>problems of the worst kind -- deserved and self-inflicted.

Not really fair, I think.  Orff's initial enthusiasm for Hitler's regime
cooled dramatically, and to avoid being used by the Nazis he hid himself
away in a Bavarian wood shack for most of the war.  He faced no official
opprobrium afterwards.

As for subtlety, that's to be found in abundance in his operas - provided
we're including dramatic as well as musical subtlety in the equation.
Music there is part of the means towards the end.  In fact "Carmina
Burana" is very subtle in the balance and contrast between blocks - his
later works, even more so.  Like Messiaen, Orff extends the possibilities
of music and invites us to listen to it in a different way.

>Did Carl Orff compose anything else of significance,
>other than Carmina?

For many admirers, of whom I am one, the "Trionfi" trilogy (Carmina
Burana, Catulli Carmina, Trionfo di Aphrodite) is only the start of the
good things.  CB was Orff's earliest large-scale work.

He refined his music considerably in the late 1940's and early 50's.
To my mind, his very greatest works are the music theatre piece "Die
Bernauerin", an unclassifiable mixture of play, opera and oratorio; "The
Christmas Story", an utterly charming setting of the familiar tale (for
children, in Bavarian dialect) without which no Christmas day is complete;
and, perhaps greatest of all, "Antigone", a magnificent, glittering,
hieratic setting of Holderlin's German text after Sophocles.  All are
available on CD.

His theatre music in the 1960's and 70's became increasingly dry and
spare.  It will not be to all tastes, though very effective on stage.
Most of it - with the exception of his setting of Shakespeare's "A
Midsummer Nights Dream" is (or has been) available on disc too.  The
influence of these later works on later minimalists, Holy and Un, is
considerable.  His revolutionary Schulwerk has already been mentioned
in this thread, and it has brought millions of children to practical
music-making worldwide, not just in the German-speaking world.

Anyone who enjoys "Carmina Burana" will most certainly enjoy the two
follow-up operas "Der Mond" (The Moon) and "Die Kluge" (Clever Woman)
which are magical, tuneful settings of traditional German fairy tales.
They have both been recorded several times, notably on EMI under Sawallisch
by a cast including Elisabeth Schwarzkopf and Hans Hotter.

Christopher Webber, Blackheath, London, UK
http://www.zarzuela.net
"ZARZUELA!" The Spanish Music Site