Fortuna as a guest in the sold-out Stadtcasino

Everyone knows it, the highly dramatic O Fortuna - has been used in countless commercials and has thus become largely detached from its original context. The piece actually forms the framework of Carl Orff's Carmina Buranaa scenic cantata about the capriciousness and ambivalence of human existence. Orff set 24 of the 254 poems in the medieval manuscript to music for it Codex Buranuswere built in the 11th and 12th centuries.

This now world-famous work was performed in its entirety on Saturday, November 11 at the Stadtcasino Basel. Organist Babette Mondry and choirmaster Tobias Stückelberger, who founded the vokal:orgel association in 2022 and regularly present new formats for choir and organ, were mainly responsible for this.

What was new in the performance of Carmina Burana the beginning: It did not start with O Fortunabut with a kind of prologue - Hanna Marti, a specialist in medieval music, sang the song, also from the Codex Buranus originating Vacillantis trutine and accompanied himself on the harp. After a transition, Orff's work followed in its original structure. The instrumentation was new: Mondry imitated most of the instruments on the versatile Stadtcasino organ, accompanied by the percussion ensemble of the FHNW Academy of Music under the direction of Matthias Würsch. It was the first time that an organ version of the Carmina Burana It was adapted by Mondry herself, who obtained the publishing rights to the work especially for this project.

Scenic elements

The choir consisted of over 200 colorfully dressed young singers, made up of the Basel Young Chamber Choir and choirs from the Bäumlihof, Kirschgarten, Muttenz and Oberwil high schools. The solo voices were soprano Jardena Flückiger, baritone Yannick Debus and countertenor Julian Schmidlin. The numerous scenic elements performed by the choir and solo voices, which the work actually provides for but which are rarely performed today, were also special.

Carmina Burana is about the ups and downs of life, the changing moods and whims of (human) nature, symbolized by the ever-turning wheel of Fortuna - in scenes in the field, in the tavern or in the courtyard of love. The performance in the Stadtcasino under the direction of Tobias Stückelberger was convincing across the board, firstly because it managed to skillfully switch back and forth between a village-naïve and apocalyptic sound. Secondly, the staging by Swiss director Mélanie Huber and the music were full of life - as it should be in a work about the ambivalences of human existence. The sold-out Stadtcasino honored the performance with a standing ovation.