Background
Taki Rentaro was born on August 24, 1879 in Tokyo, Japan. He had to move to many places during his childhood owing to his father's job. His father, Yoshihiro Taki, was a government employee.
廉太郎 滝
Taki Rentaro was born on August 24, 1879 in Tokyo, Japan. He had to move to many places during his childhood owing to his father's job. His father, Yoshihiro Taki, was a government employee.
From an early age Taki began taking interest in music. Soon after finishing elementary school he entered the Shokakai (Singing Society), and then the Tokyo Academy of Music, which course he completed in 1898. Later Taki became a student of the Tokyo Music School. In 1901 he went to the Leipzig Conservatory, Germany to study music further, but fell seriously ill with tuberculosis of the lungs and came back to Japan.
Taki became a teacher of the school, where he was taught, and won a prize with his song Kojo-no-Tsulci (Moon Over Ruined Castle). One of his famous pieces is Kōjō no Tsuki, which was included in the songbook for junior high school students, along with the Hakone-Hachiri, Hana is a well-known song, too.
His posthumous work is a solo piano piece called Urami, which he wrote four months before he died. It is said that he laid the meaning of "regret" in the title of his last piece. He played a great part in developing Japanese music and is still remembered for the many songs he composed.