Saturday, May 17, 2008
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DRIVING RHYTHMS ABOUND

Friday, May 9, 2008
MUSIC
SINGING to a packed theatre, the IW Cantata Choir sang the very individual cantata, Carmina Burana, with all the full-bodied gusto it merits and they are to be congratulated on an excellent performance, which was received with great enthusiasm.
Carl Orff, born in Munich in 1895, died there in 1982, wrote much music for education and rightly believed the unmusical child was almost non-existent.
Carmina Burana was an enormous success and is decribed by him as “profane songs for soloists, choruses with instruments and magical images, sung in a mixture of languages from early German to Latin”. These songs are drawn from a collection written in 1280, Songs From Benediktbeuren, and express the liberal outlook of that time in their openmindedness and their ribaldly and sarcastic social criticism of the double standards of the elevated clergy, rampant at that time.
The opening chorus O Fortuna was splendid, great diction and dynamics drawn from these singers by their excellent conductor, Rachel Tweddle, who threw herself into this performance with all the panache that this work of driving rhythm needed.
Primo Vere opened with a beautiful flute solo from an accomplished player, who went on to produce more in Dance. It is full of syncopation and rhythmic contradiction and is typical of the way Orff’s music, while sometimes thought of as naively simple, is also sophisticated by virtue of the orchestration. Floret Silve Nobilis was charmingly sung as was Charmer Gip Die Varwe Mir, with the sopranos injecting all the coquettish and tantalising spirit required.
After the interval, we were taken to the taberna with its bawdy inuendos where the two male soloists gave us Estuans Internius, and Olim Lacus Colueram, a strong and well intonated performance from Damian Thantrey leading to a marvellous aria from the tenor Michael Bracegirdle, who gave this comic piece about a swan being roasted all the excruciating agony deserved.
Cantata’s male section now came into its own and, encouraged by its conductor, both tenors and basses sang resoundingly well, into the realms of love, Cour D’Amour.
The baritone solo was extremely good except for a tendency to slur and the soprano solo, Circa Mia Pectoral, was well sung by Denise Leigh, winner of reality show Operatunity.
In Si Puer, the male choir members provided excellent rapport with the baritone. In Veni Veni Venias with its pulsating rhythms, the female members gave us suitable urgency. In Trutina is a most beautiful aria not heard often enough.
It should transcend us, but in this case, I missed the glorious pianissimos required.
Too soon back to the beginning with O Fortuna repeated and vibrant closure of an excellent performance from the orchestra, the soloists, the choir and their very masterly conductor. Bravo Cantata!
- Karen Taggart