Lamenti

SYNOPSIS

This work combines Carl Orff’s three Monteverdi arrangements in the following sequence:
I. Klage der Ariadne
II. Orpheus
III. Tanz der Spröden

All sections can additionally be performed separately. For plots and cast of these pieces, please refer below to the individual works.

COMMENTARY

Orff‘s preoccupation with Monteverdi was sparked off in 1921 by Curt Sachs, then the director of the Staatliches Musikinstrumentensammlung Berlin, a collection of musical instruments. Sachs had attended a performance including Orff’s settings of poetry by Werfel, was spontaneously reminded of Claudio Monteverdi when hearing this music and, immediately recognizing the musical-dramatic talent of the young composer, urged him to devote himself to the study of the Italian Renaissance composer. Orff was swiftly fired with enthusiasm and was rewarded by the first key experience of his career: he established that his own understanding of dramatic stage music corresponded without exception to the musical concepts of Monteverdi. He subsequently made a detailed study of the composer who at this time had largely sunk into oblivion, undertaking an intensive research into his works, only to establish that the available editions were merely of musicological interest and not suitable for a practical staging of the works. This spurred him on to embark on arrangements of Monteverdi’s works for musical performances on stage, beginning with Orfeo, followed by Lamento d’Arianna and finally Ballo delle Ingrate. The originally planned restoration of Il ritorno d’Ulisse in patria and L’Incoronazione di Poppea was however not pursued. Orff was not over-pleased that his Orpheus arrangement was, particularly in the 1930s and 1940s, repeatedly paired with other more or less appropriate single act works (for example with Die Kluge or Carmina Burana). For this reason and also to underline the coherence of his three Monteverdi arrangements and initiate a complete performance of all three works, Orff combined the three pieces under the Renaissance term Lamenti [lamentations] in 1956: the lamentation of a woman (Ariadne) combined with the lamentation of a man (Orpheus) and the satirical lamentation of the foolish virgins (the ungrateful ones). For a complete performance of the Lamenti, the composer envisaged a common stage design for all three works.