When everything is fine-grained, Reich’s music brings out a tremendous effect. It is necessary for each person to listen to each other, balance it, and create a harmony. It may be natural for the wind instrument section, but it can be the most difficult thing for percussion instrument. Some may say “What should we listen to while there is no melody in percussion instruments. However Reich’s music has a virtual harmony. Even tuning the drums also. However it is an extremely difficult technique to just listen to the sound that occurs at the moment and also listen to the vertical harmony in the level of millimeter unit. Tempos tend to progress faster if you are just focusing on exactly matching rhythms, and there are many things to lose as you go beyond a certain speed. Playing in faster tempo may add some excitement but on the other hand, it is wasteful that there are lots of sounds that may’ve passed by without being noticed. I stuck to the tempo range 132-144 of the score so as not to overlook even a single sound. As a result, I chose the actual tempo at between 139 and 141.

There are ring and reverberation in percussions in one note. Percussion instruments also have a “reverberation” in one note and there is a “reverberation”, when its vertical harmony sounds instantaneously, undulation will happen in the rhythm then it becomes a groove. In ethnic music around the world such as Africa, there are notes and scales naturally made up from the land and the climate, when such melody, sound and groove are combined and undulation will happen. In the meantime people start dancing. Any music has rhythm and harmony. Reich’s music has a level beyond that. From the sounds that heard as a whole, people ‘s voice is heard strangely! It is different in the parts heard by people, it is a combination of melody line, baseline, inner voice, and you can listen to them freely, taking solo, trance into the sound and groove, It will be one way of enjoying his music.

In fact the voices overlapping on top of these play a very important role. Reich himself was actually singing out the sound that heard naturally when he was composing. It is also said that it became the concept of “Drumming”. Such “voices” may tend not to be regarded as important on the ensemble. So I wonder why Steve always call Synergy Vocals to his performance? The voice part of alto, soprano in Part 2 is instructed finely in its pronunciation and it is rather B ‘or D ‘ than U’. The essence is to imitate the each sound of marimba played rubber mallets. At the moment the voice comes in, the sound of that part expands or stretches. Other parts are pulled out, interesting phenomena occurs. I was really surprised when I heard Piccolo and whistle as I was playing the part of the glockenspiel. The ears are strange thing, and when you concentrate on some parts you can hear various sounds. It is of course different by each person and creates a new harmony. Sounds shine suddenly, release colors and sing. It follows like endless.

If I may, I would like to refer some of my interactions with Steve who gave me his permission to do Drumming alone.

‘The whole piece is well done and the marimba and glock and final sections strike me as the best. The beginning of the Glock part is actually the best I’ve heard it. In my ensemble years ago and in other ensembles today,….’

I was very happy and also relieved when I read his message after submitting a rough demo to him. I was also happy to hear his compliment on the transition in Part 3, understanding the difficulties and knowing he has done so many times as well.

Part 1 is drums (Bongo) that must be tuned precisely, Part 2 is marimba, Part 3 is glockenspiel, 3 percussion instruments, and these are common percussion instruments familiar to us as an image of African music. It appears in each movement and changes into the next material. Part 4 is the ensemble of all instruments, and progresses without any breaks. One of Reich magic is here, a transition to the different instrument is important, but it is difficult to make it successful as an actual effect. The balance of various mallets and sticks in songs is also critically important. Especially in the last part of indigenous drums the change in tone color made by the difference in hardness of the mallet is a truly splendid idea, the noise which wraps up accompanying the transition of each part is progressing rhythm and frenzy drama, The marimba group that appears as if it coexists is absolutely magical, while building the resonance of the chord as a heavily overlapping keyboard instrument, they are climbing to the sky while shining brightly at the last of Part 2. Especially what he mentioned is the transition from marimba on Part 2 to glocken on Part 3. It is the most difficult section, and as I also did live so many times, however I was never ever satisfied including the tone of this glocken movement. In fact, there are cases in which it may not hold as an ensemble unless you play with earplugs. The metal sounds that you listen closely will make you not hear any pitches. I was very pleased to receive his compliment on this section even if I still felt it is not good enough even at the level of demo audio.

Then another difficult part, Part 4, Although all the instruments are fused, like the ritual of the festival, which is moving toward opening up the whole song and the musical thought, it may sound easy to imagine but there are very few successful cases here. There are only two words on the score, but those are carefully selected and give us instructions in detail. I tried to play faithfully according to the score as to keep its balance and make use of all the sounds without even missing one note. Then, you hear lots of unprecedented sounds and the construction becomes much clearer, if you could lively hear a laughter, this final movement turned into a real pleasant thing. At the end of the message from Steve it was written ‘My hope is always that people will just perform my pieces first by giving close attention to the score and then interpret them as they feel they will sound best. So, ultimately, I leave it to you and thank you for your continued devotion to my music.’