Choral Christmas: Behind the music from the #xfactor

At 9am GMT on each day of Advent, I’ll be posting a YouTube video of a piece which, in my opinion, celebrates the best of music made by the human voice. You can access the full Choral Christmas here.

Orff: O Fortuna, from Carmina Burana

Tonight in the UK sees one of the televisual events of the year – the final of singing competition, The X Factor. I am not, it must be said, a huge fan. However, anything that unites the country in a celebration of singing can’t be all bad, and even I must concede The X Factor is (only marginally) more popular than this Choral Christmas series of blog posts.

I have watched the occasional episode of The X Factor under duress, and was not massively surprised to hear a popular passage from one of the most played pieces of classical music of all time being used as incidental / background music when the contestants enter the arena. The final section from O Fortuna (beginning at 02:40 in the video above), part of Carmina Baruna, rings out to give a hint of gladiators entering the modern-day equivalent of a roman coliseum.

X Factor contestants might pause to reflect on the meaning of the section played to their entrance each week on the results show – fate, in health and in virtue, is now against me!

For today’s Choral Christmas I recommend clicking play and then heading over to Wikipedia (new window/tab) to follow a translation. After the second section is performed for the first time, it goes back to the beginning. You can also find more information about the piece there.

It’s a riotous, huge, chorus of despair. Speaking of which, good luck to tonight’s X Factor finalists, and congratulations on your almost inevitable UK Christmas number 1 single.