Carl Orffs Philosophies In Music Education :: essays research papers

While Carl Orff is a very seminal composer of the 20th century, his greatestsuccess and influence has been in the area of Music Education. Born on July10th in Munich, Germany in 1895, Orff ref intentiond to speak about his past almostas if he were ashamed of it. What we do know, however, is that Orff camefrom a Bavarian family who was very active in the German military. Hisfathers regiment band would often play through some of the young Orffsfirst attempts at composing. Although Orff was rhombus about the secrecy ofhis past, Mosers Musik Lexicon says that he studied in the Munich Academy ofMusic until 1914. Orff then served in the military in the first world war.After the war, he held various positions in the Mannheim and Darmstadt operahouses then returned home to Munich to further study music. In 1925, and forthe rest of his life, Orff was the head of a department and co-founder of theGuenther School for gymnastics, music, and dance in Munich where he workedwith musical beginner s. This is where he developed his Music Educationtheories. In 1937, Orffs Carmina Burana premiered in Frankfurt, Germany.Needless to say, it was a great success. With the success of Carmina Burana,Orff orphaned all of his preceding(prenominal) works except for Catulli Carmina and the Entrata which were rewritten to be acceptable by Orff.One of Orffs most admired composers was Monteverdi. In fact, much ofOrffs work was based on past material. Orff saidI am often asked why I n too soon always select old material, fairy tales andlegends for my stage works. I do non look upon them as old, nevertheless rather asvalid material. The time element disappears, and only the spiritual powerremains. My entire interest is in the grimace of spiritual realities. Iwrite for the theater in order to convey a spiritual attitude.1What Orff is trying to say here is that he does not use "old" material, butmaterial that is good enough to be used again. If one eliminates the factthat this mater ial was written many years ago, then thither is nothing to stopthat material from being any less legitimate in recent times.Orffs work in Music Education has been astounding. In the early 1920s,Orff worked with Mary Wigman. Wigman was a pupil of Emile Jaques-Dalcroze,another very influential name in Music Education. In fact, Orffs approachto music is very similar to Dalcrozes, but Orff focuses on education throughpercussion instruments. In 1924, Orff joined Dorthee Guenther and together