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Carmina Burana
Photos by Rex Teter Photography
Dallas Wind Symphony and several choruses charm with 'Carmina Burana'
11:48 PM CDT on Monday, September 14, 2009
By SCOTT CANTRELL / The Dallas Morning News, scantrell@dallasnews.com
The adjustable acoustics of the Meyerson Symphony Center must have been set on "high reverberation" Monday night. And the combined forces of the Dallas Wind Symphony and multiple choruses certainly set the room resounding in the first of two performances of Carl Orff's Carmina Burana.
Unlike some works transcribed from full orchestra to symphonic wind ensemble, Carmina works just fine. Even in full-orchestra guise, the piece's tangy harmonies and thrusting rhythms – accompanying medieval poems about drinking, love, sex and fickle fate – are really defined by brasses, winds and percussion.
Led by artistic director Jerry Junkin, the DWS summoned all the thrilling sounds you could want. But what was really amazing was the taut, powerful singing of the Schola Cantorum of Texas, the A Capella and Chamber Choirs from the University of North Texas, Southern Methodist University's Meadows Chorale and the Texas Boys Choir.
Standout of the three vocal soloists was David Small, his baritone pleasantly textured, his declamation vivid, but his falsetto feeble. Ideally, the soprano part could have used a voice a size larger than Angela Turner Wilson's, but her gleaming top notes and gorgeous "In trutina" banished reservations. Alas, Jeffrey Jones-Ragona wasn't up to the cruelly high tenor part.
Since I can't remember the wind symphony performing with a chorus, maybe it gets a one-time forgiveness for not providing an absolute necessity for any vocal or choral concert: printed texts and translations, and enough light for reading them. Did it not occur to anyone that the audience might want to know what was being sung in Latin and medieval German?
The concert opened with Ron Nelson's Savannah River Holiday, its razzle and dazzle spelled by a dreamily atmospheric middle section. Vaclav Nelhybel's Trittico was another showpiece, mingling defiant statement, perky little dance, a strange and increasingly surreal procession and noisily contrapuntal exuberance. As the Scent of Spring Rain ..., by Jonathan Newman, was a nondescript wash.
L-o-n-g lines and chaos at the box office didn't speak well for the Dallas Center for the Performing Arts as the wind symphony's new ticket agent. If you want to attend Tuesday, order your tickets ahead of time; but even the will-call line Monday was a 20-minute wait.
Plan your life
Repeats at 8 p.m. Tuesday at the Meyerson Symphony Center, 2301 Flora. $16 to $49. 214-880-0202. www.dws.org.
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