Cloud Dance (for 14 Percussionists & piano)

Description

Cloud Dance is a stunning and engaging work that begins by emulating the sounds of rolling thunder, falling rain drops, and gently stirred wind chimes in a summer rainstorm. It becomes a dance in which several central ideas are developed as if they were rain clouds being moved by the wind, shifting shapes and colliding into one another only to take on new forms and repeat the cycle. Eventually, the dance reaches a fever pitch in a crash of thunder, and the work ends as the storm does with the rain slowing to a stop and the warm summer sun beginning to peek out from behind the clouds.

Genre: Percussion Ensemble | # of Players: 15

Level: Medium Advanced | Duration: 7:30

Instrumentation

Player 1: Crotales (2 octaves), Glockenspiel, Castanets

Player 2: Glockenspiel, Castanets

Player 3: Vibraphone 1

Player 4: Vibraphone 2, Lead Pan, Wind Chimes

Player 5: Marimba 1 (4.3-octave), Thunder Tube or Auxiliary Cymbal

Player 6: Marimba 2 (4.3-octave), Thunder Tube or Auxiliary Cymbal

Player 7: Marimba 3 (4.6-octave), Thunder Tube or Auxiliary Cymbal

Player 8: Marimba 4 (5-octave)

Player 9: Timpani (5 drums), Suspended Cymbal (inverted on drum)

Player 10: Rain Stick, Guiro, Bongos

Player 11: Wind Machine, Tam-Tam, Cabasa

Player 12: Suspended Cymbal, China Cymbal, Maracas

Player 13: Large Thundersheet

Player 14: Bass Drum

Piano