De Temporum Fine Comoedia

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Operas by Carl Orff
Der Mond (1939) Die Kluge (1943) Antigone (1949) De Temporum Fine Comoedia (1973)
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De Temporum Fine Comoedia, literally Play of the End of Time, is an opera or musical play by 20th Century German composer Carl Orff. It was his last work and took ten years to compose (1962 to 1972). Its premiere was at the Salzburg Music Festival on August 20, 1973, by Herbert von Karajan and the Cologne Radio Symphony Orchestra and Chorus. In this highly personal work Orff presented a mystery play in which he summarized his view of the end of time, sung in Greek, German and Latin.

[edit] Music

It utilises very unusual instrumentation:

6 flutes (all doubling on piccolos), 6 E♭ clarinets (3 doubling on B♭ clarinets) contrabassoon 6 horns in F 8 trumpets in C 6 trombones tuba

a consort of 4 viols 8 contrabasses electronic tape an enormous amount of percussion (including about 100 instruments) 3 harps 3 pianos, each with two players electronic organ

The percussion section, requiring about 25-30 players, consists of:

2 snare drums 6 tambourines 3 tenor drums 2 bass drums (one with attached cymbal) 3 darabukka (alto, tenor, and bass) 3 tom-toms 6 congas bass conga 4 "timpanetti" with unpitched wooden drum heads (soprano, alto, tenor, and bass) 5 timpani (3 with cymbals) 5 crotales 5 suspended cymbals 1 pair of crash cymbals 3 copper tam-tams (40-60 centimeters in diameter)

2 large tam-tams gong pitched to low C dobaci (a Japanese bell) pitched to C♯ 5 high bronze bells "at the interval of a semitone" two sets of tubular bells triangle guiro whip maracas 6 castanets hyoshigi angklung 3 wood bells 5 wood blocks

"simple" and "double" ratchets, 3 "large church ratchets" 4 water glasses celesta glockenspiel lithophone metallophone xylophone tenor xylophone bass xylophone 2 marimbas.

The music on magnetic tape is used in four different places, most notably at the end when Lucifer descends. The total forces utilized for the taped sections are comprised of

piccolo 8 flutes 10 trumpets in C 4 trombones 2 pianos grand church organ glockenspiel

marimba crotales timpano, as well as large vocal forces: tenor and contralto solos a large chorus divided into various sections a children's chorus (soprano).

There is also one spoken part, an echo of one of the sibyls' spoken dialogue, accompanied by wind machine.

In addition to loud percussive passages, there are also as periods of calm piano and straight dialogue. In this culminative piece of his he almost abandons his diatonicism to chromaticism, this done to enrich and thicken the musical texture.

As the play is about to finish, after the destruction of all worldly material, Satan asks for forgiveness and is restored to Angel Lucifer, thus forgiven. The unsettling chromaticism here ends and Bach's Before Thy Throne strikes up.