Composer Stephen Paulus was relieved to hear that the Tucson Symphony Orchestra is kicking off its "Carmina!" concerts next week with his choral piece "Voices of Light."
Opening the concert is a cakewalk; following Carl Orff would be almost a nightmare.
" 'Carmina (Burana)' is this towering piece with all these climactic moments. It's really, really loud," Paulus explained in a call from home in Minneapolis on Tuesday. " 'Carmina' ends with a bang; mine ends with a whisper."
The TSO is only the fifth group to perform "Voices," which Paulus wrote for the Westminster Choir College in New Jersey to mark its 75th anniversary. Joseph Flummerfelt conducted the work with the New York Philharmonic in April 2001.
"It's a 25-minute piece for full chorus and orchestra. If that gets performed beyond the premiere, you're lucky," said Paulus, who was the TSO's composer-in-residence in the mid-1990s. "It's doable. It's not tremendously difficult. My music is the kind that when you get it, it sticks."
"It is really a wonderful piece," said Bruce Chamberlain, whose TSO Chorus will perform "Voices" and Orff's "Carmina Burana" in the orchestra's three upcoming concerts. "It's proved to be a real challenge for us. The piece is actually quite involved. There are some wonderful harmonic touches, some cluster chords that evolve in interesting ways. There are no solos; it is choir and orchestra from beginning to end."
Paulus set his piece to five texts from two 13th-century female mystics, Mechtilde of Magdeburg and Hadewijch II. The texts — "Humanity Sings," "In the Infinite," "The Oneness Within," "The Naked Circle" and "How God Comes to the Soul" — are written from a Christian perspective, simplistic yet deeply spiritual.
"The texts are spiritual but not necessarily religious. They don't preach," Paulus was quick to add.
In one section, Paulus assigns the choir to sing on one note and the orchestra plays around them.
"It sounds like they're doing something really magical. It's a laser beam of intensity," he said.
"Voices" sets the scene for "Carmina Burana," based on the writings of 13th-century monks. The TSO last performed it in 2001 — two years before the TSO formed the TSO Chorus — with the University of Arizona Choral Association and the Tucson Arizona Boys Chorus.
Orff's main mission in music was to teach youngsters to play, but in between running his music school he composed operas and other works. He wrote "Carmina Burana" as a scenic cantata — 25 movements for soprano, tenor and baritone soloists, boys choir, choir and orchestra. It was first performed in Frankfurt, Germany, in 1937, and made its American debut in San Francisco in 1958.
The work brims with sexual undertones. The text is a collection of songs about wine, women and love based on poems penned in Latin, Old German and Old French from a 1280 manuscript unearthed in the Benedictine monastery of Beuren, in southern Germany.
By today's standards, the sexuality is subdued, but the music is so rhythmic and energetic, the work appeals to a broad audience.
"The music is so attractive. There is that kind of base animal instinct behind it," Chamberlain said. "There certainly are some references to it in the poems themselves. There's the whole tavern scene . . . that's basically frat boys drinking beer. But it's still very effective and very powerful music."
"I love the work," said soloist Charles Roe, a baritone who first sang it in Texas 40 years ago and performed it with the TSO six years ago. "It's exciting and thrilling, and it's a real challenge for all three of the soloists. It takes the extreme top of my range. . . . I'm singing where the tenors usually sing."
The concerts will be the biggest test yet of the TSO Chorus. TSO music director George Hanson is confident that the chorus — numbering more than 90 — and the orchestra are jelling as one.
"This is the sort of piece that requires that at such a high level, and when it happens it's going to be quite thrilling," Hanson said.
Preview
"Carmina!"
• Presented and performed by: Tucson Symphony Orchestra.
• Featuring: TSO Chorus and the Tucson Arizona Boys Chorus, with soloists Mary Wilson, Jason Ferrante and Charles Roe.
• When: 8 p.m. Thursday and next Friday, and 2 p.m. April 15
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• Where: Tucson Music Hall, 260 S. Church Ave., Downtown.
• Tickets: $23-$52 through Ticketmaster, 321-1000; or the TSO box office, 882-8585. Prices are subject to change.
• Program: Stephen Paulus' "Voices of Light." Carl Orff's "Carmina Burana."
Did you know . . . Excerpts from "Carmina Burana" have made it into big-screen films, including "Excalibur," "Natural Born Killers" and "Jackass."
