Sydney Chamber Choir – Carmina Burana
Sydney Chamber Choir’s first performance for 2016 takes the audience to the excesses and restraints, peaks and troughs of 13th and 14th century Europe, which still influence our thinking today.
The program features Carl Orff’s exciting two-piano/percussion version of the profane Carmina Burana conducted by Richard Gill OAM, with baritone Alexander Knight. Says Mr Gill “Here’s how the story begins to unfold…
The Empress of the World, Dame Fortune, accompanies us as we walk together through the springtime. She leads us to a Tavern where, not surprisingly, the liquor does its work. We gamble, we drink, we sing, we dance, we eat roast swan and, regrettably, drink some more and experience our first taste of remorse…
“Fortunately, we can bring our lives into balance by focusing on one of the great triumphs of the 14th century, the first Mass written by an individual, namely the Messe de Notre Dame. Composers today still use many of the techniques employed by the work’s composer Guillaume de Machaut” he adds.
To support the idea, the choir has commissioned three interludes by young Australian composers, Josie Gibson, Michael Paton and Olivia Swift, to interpolate between movements of the Mass, demonstrating the continuation of a tradition of composition using sacred texts, which has been in existence at least since 400AD.
Carl Orff’s bold and beautiful work, which draws on 24 secular poems from the Middle Ages has been arranged by Mr Gill for percussion and two pianos played by Kathy Day and Chris Cartner.
The Sydney Chamber Choir is teaming up with the Sydney University percussion ensemble, Splash, as well as 40 young performers from the NSW Public School Singers for this performance.
