O Fortuna

Description

Soprano, Alto, Tenor, Bass, Piano — This piece’s text comes from an early 13-century collection of poems called the Carmina Burana. “O Fortuna” specifically describes fate, a power unable to be stopped that can bring both life or death, power or poverty, to both gods and mortals alike. This text was famously first set by the German composer Carl Orff in his piece Carmina Burana in 1936. This contemporary setting expresses the unpredictable and sometimes capricious nature of fate in its use of mixed meter, at times shifting without warning between 7/8 and 4/4. While current listeners may not hold the superstitious beliefs the original medieval authors may have held, the concept of fate as a power that can both plague and please is still an idea that captures our present imagination. Translation and pronunciation guide: O Fortuna velut lunaOh for-toon’-ah veh’-loot loo’-nah O Fortune, like the moon statu variabilis,stah’-too vah-ree-ah’-bee-lees you are changeable, semper crescis aut decrescis;sehm’-per krehs’-tsees ahˆoot deh-krehs’-tsees ever waxing and waning; vita detestabilis vee’-tah deh-teh-stah’-bee-lees hateful life nunc obdurat et tunc curatnoonk ohb-doo’-raht eht toonk koo’-raht first oppresses and then soothes ludo mentis aciem,loo’-doh mehn’-tees ah-tsee’-ehm as fancy takes it; egestatem, potestatemeh-geh-stah’-tehm poh-teh-stah’-tehm poverty and power dissolvit ut glaciem.Dee-sohl’-veet oot glah-tsee’-ehm it melts them like ice.

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