O Fortuna (Orff)

The cantata is based on a medieval Goliardic poetry collection of the same name, from which the poem "O Fortuna" provides the words sung in the movement.

Carl Orff encountered the collection in 1934 and worked with a Latin and Greek enthusiast, Michel Hofmann, to select and organize 24 of the poems into a libretto.

[2][3] "O Fortuna" opens at a slow pace, at 60 minims per minute (in 31, notated in Orff's notation as 3/), with thumping drums and energetic choir that drops quickly into a whisper, then doubling speed to 120 minims per minute (in 32)[4] and building slowly in a steady crescendo of drums and short string and horn notes peaking on one last long powerful note and ending abruptly.

Conductor Marin Alsop wrote that it "begins with all forces at full throttle, then immediately scale[s] back in an ominous warning repetition that builds to a climactic close".

[1] In The Oxford Handbook of Music and Advertising, David Clem highlights how the poem's themes like human struggle and fate are commonly divorced from popular usage.

In a 24 February 1992 case in Dutch court, Orff's heirs successfully argued that they never authorised the use of the work for electronic dance music.