Track Listing

1. Mbira
2. Rainforest Suite: Forest Dreams of Bach
3. Rainforest Suite: Drumsong
4. Rainforest Suite: Surface
5. Sanctuary
6. Temple of Eyes
7. Raining Room
8. Veil of Mist
9. Passage in Bronze

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #159167 in Music
• Released on: 1991-07-01
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: .20 pounds

Amazon.com essential recording
On his first widespread release, Rich contemplates the ravaged state of the world's rain forests, and the music herein reflects both the beauty and mystery of those gradually disappearing environments. These aspects of beauty and mystery are represented by pulsating, rhythmic tracks and denser atmospheric works, respectively. The former is epitomized by opening piece "Mbira," a playful dance of xylophone-like percussion and bamboo flute accompanied by a fretless bass gently gliding over them; while the latter is best showcased in the ghostly flute free fall which builds during the eerie, airy "Sanctuary." The composer has such an uncanny ability to conjure vivid musical imagery that can transport listeners into his vision of a rain forest. One can practically feel the dampness of the vegetation, envision the evergreen locale, and connect with the pulse of life within its dense ecosystem. Rainforest was Rich's first breakthrough album, and it remains his most commercially successful. --Bryan Reesman

Customer Reviews

breakthrough release
This was the album that brought Robert Rich to a greater audience, and I still think it's his best--though he is quite prolific, and by now there are several other titles that just about fully measure up to it. Rich has a wonderful way of producing a non-static kind of ambience; one might say that much of his work approaches the more classical concept of tone poetry. Here the imagery is particularly successful, with the feeling of the rainforest plainly evident as one washes along through one semi-melodic, meandering piece after another. An excellent place to start if one is unfamiliar with Rich's music.

ESSENTIAL RICH
"RAINFOREST" REPRESENTS A CULMINATION OF ROBERT RICH'S EARLY WORK AND A LAUNCHING GROUND FOR OTHER GREAT FUTURE ALBUMS. THE COVER ARTWORK AND TITLE "RAINFOREST" MAY MISTAKENLY FOOL SOME. THIS IS NOT TO BE CONFUSED WITH A GENERIC PIECE OF NEW AGE MUSIC, BUT RATHER SOME OF THE BEST "SPACEMUSIC" OR AMBIENT CREATED AT THE TIME. THIS IS A CLASSIC, WITH SOMETIMES HAUNTING SYNTH-TONES COMBINED WELL WITH LAID-BACK PERCUSSION AND NATURE SOUNDS THAT DON'T SOUND "INSERTED" JUST FOR EFFECTS. I WAS 18 WHEN I FIRST HEARD THIS CD AND REMEMBER FEELING TRULY TRANSPORTED INTO ANOTHER WORLD. RICH IS A MASTER IN THIS FIELD, AND "RAINFOREST" IS THE FIRST PLACE TO LOOK HIM UP.

Spell Binding
I was overjoyed to find this sensational album/CD. I have been truly enchanted by it since I got my first cassette of it 10 years ago. Spell binding, Rich weaves a a lush path of musical inner vision through the essence of all you imagine the rainforest to be. Here are the shadowed, secret trails deep through the jungle, the jaguar's lingering gaze, the dazzle of dappled sunlight over head in a catherdral of trees; crashing intensity of tropical rain, and the steamy mist rising all around you, shot through with the flaming colors of tropical flowers, birds and orchids. This recording is beyond New Age or Ambient alone, and to me is the benchmark against which I measure all other "rainforest" recordings.