Welsh Carmina Burana

[greenilex]

Had a look at the 2002 translation and still don't see the point....the shockingness depends on the state of your mind, but it's not about strolling hand in hand in the park. Translating verse is a risky business.

Luckily the kiddy chorus tends to know a fair amount before they start.

Direction last night was spot on, I thought.

[doversoul1]

Going back to yesterday’s Carmina Burana:
Listening to the cheering at the end of the performance, I couldn’t help wondering if some music is more an event than a work of art to be listened to. I could imagine all the families and friends of the performers waving and cheering, especially those of the young people and the children. I think the atmosphere came through very well on the radio, which was helped by the presenter who was clearly excited but not over the top or gushing. Isn’t it a concert like this that could get people to become interested in classical music? Without any gimmick add to it. I’ll say: Well done Radio3.

[greenilex]

At last, someone who admits to thinking the whole project was worthwhile, as I do. Let's have more events if works of art turn people off.

Well done indeed.

[Oldcrofter]

Interesting. I just looked out my old translation (from 1980) - I've never seen a translation that fits the music apart from my own.

As an example, I'll take a random verse from David Parlett's translation of In Taberna:

Some are drinking, some are playing,
some their vulgar side displaying:
most of those who like to gamble
wind up naked in the scramble;
some emerge attired in new things,
some in bits and bobs and shoestrings:
no one thinks he'll kick the bucket
dicing for a beery ducat.

And my own was this:

Some are gaming, some are drinking,
Some of indiscretions thinking,
Some men gamble at the table,
All night long if they are able;
There are those who put on sacking
When they find their clothes are lacking,
Others win some new apparel
As the wine flows from the barrel.

The original Latin is:

Quidam ludunt, quidam bibunt,
Quidam indiscrete vivunt,
Sed in ludo qui morantur
ex his quidam denudantur,
Quidam ibi vestiuntur,
quidam saccis induuntur.
Ibi nullus timet mortem
Sed pro Baccho mittunt sortem.

Congratulations, David Parlett ! Looks like an excellent translation.

One of the major problems is that Latin has innumerable two-syllable rhymes - which in Englsh is usually associated with humorous verse and doggerel. Plus the fact that Latin can sometimes say a great deal in very few words.

I've greatly enjoyed singing Carmina Burana a couple of times in the chorus. We didn't sing my translation in English - that was done for the audience programme. Quite a challenge but I enjoyed that challenge too.

[Oldcrofter]

"Had a look at the 2002 translation and still don't see the point... Translating verse is a risky business." (Greenilex)

Sorry you feel that way, Greenilex. Very few of the singers or audience would know enough Latin, Medieval French and Middle High German to make much of the text so that's what translators do, they make it available to others. A verse translation, which should be as close as possible to the content and the spirit of the original, can help to convey some of the vigour and humour of the original.

Not sure why verse translation might be " a risky business" - I dare say more translators have come to grief at the hands of jealous husbands than at the hands of angry poets !

[Bert Coules]

Oldcrofter, thanks so much for the extract from your own translation: fascinating to be able to compare two different takes on the same material. Someone, somewhere should mount the work in English.

And I agree completely that translation is valuable and worthwhile: in the vast majority of cases it's what the words mean that inspires a composer, far more than how they sound, important as that secondary consideration might be for some. It's true of opera, it's true of lieder, and it's true of a work like Carmina Burana.

[greenilex]

I have a feeling that since this material is directly connected with the mediaeval university - much of it being student parody of Latin hymns of the time - most choral directors take the opportunity of improving their choristers' language skills. The French and German elements most definitely don't work in modern F and G.

You will say to me "but no one studies Latin any more"..... and now imagine my reply.

I did enjoy Oldcrofter's translation, which is a big improvement on the other. It's just the verse element which can be dodgy - not the idea of translating verse into prose for comprehension purposes, so long as no poetic merit is claimed.

[Bert Coules]

But why shouldn't poetic merit be claimed for a translation?

[greenilex]

The problem arises, I think, when the content is not original but the language is overblown and pretentious, as frequently happens when little persons cling to the shoelaces of giants.

People often translate their own poetry, and the result can be better than the original. Otherwise, all I can say is, beware...

[Bert Coules]

...as frequently happens when little persons cling to the shoelaces of giants.

Do you really hold that every poet is a giant and every translator a "little person"?