he main idea behind Orff in his work was "total theater", a very original synthesis of music, singing, poetry, dance and stage play. "Carmina burana" is the name of a thirteenth-century collection of secular songs and poetry - mainly about love, on the basis of which Carl Orff composed a stage cantata in the 20th century - a piece for orchestra, choir and solo voices, in which rhythm and simply harmonized choral parts dominate. The most famous fragment of the cantata is - extremely well known not only to music lovers - the choir's song "O Fortuna" that begins and ends. Percussion instruments play the leading role in instrumental accompaniment, as these are what the composer considered to be related to the soul and the area of its activity as serving to transmit energy.
Orff's "Carmina burana" consists of three parts, preceded by a prologue entitled "Fortuna Imperatrix Mundi" ("Fortune, the ruler of the world"), in which the author complains about the changeability of fate and human dependence on the vagaries of fortune.
The first part of "Primo Verte" ("Spring") sings the charms of awakening nature, its colors and the emerging desire for love.
The second part of "In taverna" ("In the tavern") are songs that celebrate the joys of feasting in good company. It ends with the conclusion: “The country is wasting away, youth is wild, (...) the whole world is already laughing at us, already pointing a finger at us. But those who are insulting towards us, who circulate gossiping around the world, they will wipe out from the books of the righteous, and they will be plunged into hell. "
III "Cour d'amours" ("Court of Love") is the main part of the cantata. Her motto is that love is everywhere around us. The songs celebrate earthly love in all its manifestations.
The whole thing ends with a return to the content of the prologue - complaints about the instability of the graces of fortune.
