Carmina Burana was written by the German composer Carl Orff in 1935–1936, premiering in 1937 in Frankfurt am Main.

What Carmina Burana Is

  • It is a 20th‑century scenic cantata for chorus, soloists, and orchestra.
  • The text is based on 24 poems from the medieval collection also called Carmina Burana , mostly in Latin with some Middle High German.
  • Its famous opening and closing movement is “O Fortuna,” which has appeared widely in films, ads, and popular culture.

Quick extra facts

  • Orff discovered the published medieval texts in the 1930s and selected 24 of them to set to music.
  • The manuscript source of the poems was found in 1803 at the monastery of Benediktbeuern in Bavaria, which is why the work’s Latin title means “Songs of Beuern.”

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