Trionfi

Description

Orffs best-known composition is more frequently encountered in the concert hall than in the opera house, but it was originally conceived for the stage, where it became the first panel of a theatrical triptych which references the lavish and exotic tableaux of Renaissance entertainments at ducal palaces in Mantova, Florence and Rome. The common theme of the trilogys diverse parts is the triumph of love, wherever it is encountered: in the beer-soaked medieval taverns of Carmina burana, the urgent Classical poetry of Catullus or the more refined and elliptical reflections on Eros by Sappho and Euripides. Over the 15 years of its composition, the soundworld of Trionfi evolved, from the crashing gongs and brass of Carmina burana to an emphasis on percussive instruments piano, drums, xylophones prominent among them in the more direct, less lyrically effusive setting of Trionfo di Afrodite. Throughout, however, the influence of Stravinsky is palpable in word-setting, harmony and instrumentation, and in particular his vernacular masterpiece Les Noces: indeed Trionfo di Afrodite also depicts a wedding. Recordings of the complete trilogy are far less frequently encountered than the standalone blockbuster that is Carmina burana, and this 1970s East-German set has much to recommend it, not least the punchy, no-nonsense direction of Herbert Kegel (who conducted and recorded very many of Orffs large-scale works, including his operas) and some radiant soprano singing from his wife at the time, Celestina Casapietra. ""What distinguishes the music-making throughout,"" considered Gramophones critic in 1979, ""is the consistently superb singing of the Leipzig choir, from which Kegel produces thrillingly clean articulation and the widest range of dynamic contrast and colour performances that are all among the finest available.