CARL ORFF 1895 - 1982

Carl Orff (July 10, 1895 – March 29, 1982) was a 20th-century German composer, best known for his cantata Carmina Burana (1937). In addition to his career as a composer, Orff developed an influential approach toward music education for children. According to Canadian historian Michael H. Kater, during Orff's denazification process in Bad Homburg Orff claimed that he had helped establish the "White Rose" resistance movement in Germany. There was no evidence for this other than his own word, and other sources dispute his claim. Kater also made a particularly strong case in his earlier writings that Orff collaborated with Nazi German authorities. However, in Orff's denazification file, discovered by Viennese historian Oliver Rathkolb in 1999, no remark on the White Rose is recorded; and in Composers of the Nazi Era: Eight Portraits (2000) Kater recanted his earlier accusations to some extent. In any case, Orff's assertion that he had been anti-Nazi during the war was accepted by the American denazification authorities, who changed his previous category of "gray unacceptable" to "gray acceptable", enabling him to continue to compose for public presentation, and to enjoy the royalties that the popularity of Carmina Burana had earned for him.
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