Creation : 1981
Duration : 12′
Toru Takemitsu’s Rain Tree combines a wonderful percussion trio with some very effective lighting to produce one of the most dramatic percussion pieces ever created. Rain Tree is a joy to experience not only as the performer but to the audience as well. “It is called the ‘Rain Tree’ because it seems to make it rain. Whenever it rains at night, throughout the following morning the tree makes drops fall from all its richly growing leaves. While the other trees quickly dry out after the rain, the Rain Tree, because its leaves, no bigger than fingertips grow so closely together, can store up raindrops in its leaves. Truly an ingenious tree!” – quoted from “Atama no ii Ame no Ki” (The Ingenious Rain Tree) by Kenzaburo Oe (from the score)
Instrumentation –
Player A: Marimba (4.0 octave), 3 crotales (F#, Bb, C low octave)
Player B: Marimba (4.0 octave), 3 crotales [A (below middle C), Ab, B low octave]
Player C: Vibraphone, 11 crotales [B (below middle C), Eb, E, F, F#, G, Ab, A low octave – C#, F, C# high octave]