BURANING MY BUNS ORFF
The Uncle Ernie of Composers
Fuck Orff, Carl, you old pervert
You think you are such an ace choir singer. What’s this? Carmina Burana? It’s in Latin? What’s the problem? You’ve sung a million settings of the Latin mass. Gratias agimus tibi propter magnam gloriam tuam and all that. You could sing it in your sleep. It slides over your tongue like blueberry ice cream on a hot day.
Cantiones profanae? How hard could it be?
You are in for a rude shock, Mister Smartypants!
hoc est opus ut queratur, sic quid loquar, audiatur.
Say that three times fast. Note that que is pronounced kvay, quid is kveed, and quar is kvar. Yes, I love to kvetch. You told me that before. But when I first tried this my mouth parts refused to say it, forcing me to repeat it about 1/4 speed over and over until they got the hang of it.
The speed goal is ♩ = 132, that is, 1/3 again as fast as Stayin’ Alive, in which ♩ = 100, and which is what you sing to yourself when you are trying to rescue someone whose heart has stopped. You fit two syllables on each of those ♩s, that is, each of those Stayin’ Alive X 1.3 thumps. It can be somewhat slower, or faster if the conductor is in a sadistic mood. It’s always a bad idea to perform CPR during choir practice.
The pace increases to ♩ = 144 as it reaches every bass and tenor’s favorite, The Bibits, which culminate in
bibit soror, bibit frater, bibit anus, bibit mater, bibit iste, bibit ille, bibunt centum, bibunt mille
That is to say
the sister drinks, the brother drinks, the old lady drinks, the mother drinks, this man drinks, that man drinks, a hundred drink, a thousand drink.
I can now crank that passage fast enough for even the evilest of choir directors.
Your wicked Uncle Carl set plenty of other fun lyrics such as
Oh, oh, oh! totus floreo, iam amore virginali totus ardeo! novus, novus novus amor est, quo pereo!
As in
Oh, oh, oh! I am bursting out all over! I am burning all over with first love! New, new love is what I am dying of!
The children’s choir sings that. I suppose that by itself might not get us all arrested, but during this same chorus the adults sing
My virginity makes me frisky, my simplicity holds me back. Oh! oh! oh! etc.¹
It’s not like we hustle the children on and off stage between verses. Besides, they previously sang,
Cupid flies everywhere seized by desire. Young men and women are rightly coupled.²
But it’s all in Latin so who’s gonna know?
Having taught your mouth parts to do what they never thought possible, and at risk of exposing yourself to a possible bust for child endangerment, or, if you’re lucky, cancellation for being a perv, you now get to hire an orchestra, engage a ballet company, book a concert hall, and present Wrestlemania theme music³,
or, if you prefer, a beer commercial.
Gatorade, maybe?
I can’t wait.
All kidding aside, it really is an utter blast to hear, or watch, or even more, to sing. I can’t imagine what it’s like to dance it. I’ve sung it before but this time around I’m practicing my 71 year old mouth parts Orff so as to enjoy it to the fullest. It might not come around to me again, as a singer. If any of you are going to be in Rhode Island on March 11 check it out!
Special thanks to Andrew Rodwin for editing and Gary Chapin for editing and for the subtitle. So don’t blame me for that.
For straight man information about Carmina Burana please follow this link.
¹ Chorus #22: Tempus est Iocundum
² Chorus #15: Amor Volat Undique
³ No Carmina after about 1:30.
Source for Carmina Burana text and translation: https://www.rwb.org/uploads/documents/Carmina_Burana_translation.pdf