Nostalghia

Toru Takemitsu was an avid lover of film to the point of watching as many as 300 motion pictures per year and leaving behind nearly 100 works of film music. For Takemitsu, Andrei Tarkovskij is one of the film directors he admired and among his works, he liked Nostalghia the most. The composer highly appreciated Tarkovskij‘s keen sensitivity to sound, and in an interview, Takemitsu passionately commented on the recording of the water sound used in a scene in Nostalghia: that the epoch-making technology of recording and skillful sound usage caused the transformation of space in the film. About his piece the composer stated: ‘the fractionalized string orchestra creates a feeling of water and mist, which are characteristic images in Tarkovskij’s films.’