Just after last week’s post I learned that Ryuichi Sakamoto - the Japanese musician whose career spanned pop, experimental electronic, classical ambient and Oscar-winning film composition - had died aged 71.
Music as cinema
Ryuichi Sakamoto came to prominence as part of Japanese technopop outfit Yellow Magic Orchestra. He also developed a career as a solo musician, composer, producer and actor. He starred alongside David Bowie in 'Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence' (1983) Having no background in acting, he agreed under the condition that he could also score the film. The movie’s synth-heavy title track (played on piano above) remained one of Mr. Sakamoto’s most famous compositions. He often adapted it, including for Forbidden Colours a vocal version with the singer David Sylvian. Sakamoto also composed the soundtracks to films such as 'The Last Emperor' (1987), 'The Sheltering Sky' (1990) and 'The Revenant' (2015).
Music as advocacy
He became outspoken as an environmentalist, recording the sounds of a melting glacier for his 2009 record “Out of Noise.” elements of which he performed on an out-of-tune piano that had been partly submerged in the 2011 Tohoku tsunami. After the nuclear disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station in 2011, Ryuichi Sakamoto became an activist in Japan’s antinuclear movement, organizing a No Nukes concert in 2012 at which a reunited Yellow Magic Orchestra performed.
Music as spaciousness
However in later years his music became much more spacious and ambient. He said:
“I wanted to hear the resonance. I want to have less notes and more spaces. Spaces, not silence. Space is resonant, is still ringing. I want to enjoy that resonance, to hear it growing.”
Sakamoto began playing piano at the age of six, with a classical piano education before moving on to jazz. He was influenced by the work of John Cage and studied composition and ethnomusicology at Tokyo University of the Arts.
After his exploration into electronic music he returned to his classical roots in the 90s. He wrote a symphony, Discord exploring grief and salvation (with spoken word contributions by David Byrne and Patti Smith), and an opera, LIFE a meditation on 20th century history.
More recently, he recorded what became his final album, “12,” as a kind of diary of sketches, following a lengthy hospitalisation for cancer treatment, through 2021 and 2022.
“I just wanted to be showered in sound. I had a feeling that it’d have a small healing effect on my damaged body and soul.”
Sakamoto’s favourite quote is: art is long, life is short. And he certainly leaves his beautiful art form for us to enjoy long beyond his passing.
Find out more about the remarkable work of Ryuichi Sakamoto.
Gratitude
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Thank you for this.. interesting and stuff i didnt know. Revisiting his music today.