Carmina Burana with the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra

“O fortuna!” From its famous opening notes, Carl Orff’s Carmina Burana, a cantata based on 24 poems from the medieval collection Carmina Burana, will shake Stifel Theatre to its foundation.

Orff’s work charts the course of fate with songs of joy, love and celebration, and conductor Stéphane Denève will craft a first-half trilogy of loss and fateful farewell.

In Arvo Pärt’s Cantus in Memoriam Benjamin Britten, pure sounds will come as if from heaven, and then Lera Auerbach will bring audiences to the heat of the sun in Icarus.

The finale will come from Richard Wagner’s Tristan and Isolde, ending the concert with a salute to eternal love.

The performances at Stifel Theatre on Feb. 17 and 18 will feature soprano Ying Fang in her SLSO debut.