John Terauds, Musical Toronto

The feature draw was an all-stops-pulled performance of Carl Orff’s modern classic from 1936, Carmina Burana. The Toronto Symphony was joined by 116 members of the Toronto Mendelssohn Choir, three-and-a-half-dozen young voices of the Toronto Children’s Chorus, Romanian-born soprano Valentina Farcas, American tenor Nicholas Phan and Canadian baritone James Westman.

Music director Peter Oundjian led a nicely modulated, clearly laid-out interpretation that offered a full, rich orchestral sound, remarkable precision from the choristers and a running narrative of viscerally engaging rhythms. The fortissimo passages were taken all-out, threatening to raise the hall’s circular roof a couple of times during the evening.

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