classical music samples

I would like to include a small sample of carl orff's carmina burana as part of a flash animation in my website. Is this legal or do I need to pay someone royalties?

Printed music published before 1923, or unpublished for authors who died before 1934, is public domain. You may freely use such music. See: http://www.copyright.cornell.edu/training/Hirtle_Public_Domain.htm

Sound recordings were not protected by copyright law before 1972. State law and/or common law might protect such recordings. However in at least one case, pre-1972 recordings of classical music were held to be unprotected. See: http://www.salans.com/news/NY082003_wins.cfm

Unfortunately for you, Carl Orff's Carmina burana was written in 1936 and he lived from 1895-1982. You cannot use this piece on your website.

Choose something else. For example, see:
http://www.r-vcr.com/~pastmasters/composers/index.htm
http://www.r-vcr.com/mp3pd/1Compilation/index.html

You may wish to contact the musical composers society website, www.ascap.com to make an inquiry about this to see what their response might be.