Sakamoto’s 70th • The Many Musics of a Beautiful Soul

by Michael Rosin

Ryuichi Sakamoto is a Japanese-American film composer, electronic musician, pianist, and recording artist. He was born on this day, January 17th, in 1952.
I wanted to curate a collection of “Listen Lists” as I call them, one for each of the many genres that Ryuichi Sakamoto has mastered over his almost five decade-long career. Few respectable musicians have been so successful in opposing genres—from pop to the avant-garde, from acoustic classical to techno synthpop—and even less have expanded these genres. Sakamoto has always embraced their inherent differences, yet still managed to imbue his unmistakable poignant style into each of them.

One of the things that has always drawn me to Sakamoto’s music is the way he voices his chords; it’s often very subtle, but makes all the heart-breaking difference. This is perhaps best heard in his solo piano recordings.

Sakamoto is most known for his work as a film composer. His score for The Last Emperor won an Academy Award, but the most recognizable movie theme he’s ever composed is Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence, one of his firsts, which he also starred in alongside David Bowie.

Sakamoto is considered a pioneer of electronic music; this defined most of his early career. Here are other arrangements and miscellaneous selections that show his depth and grasp of such disparate types of music.

A famous film he recently composed music for was the brutal and beautiful frontier tale, The Revenant. This should’ve been added to the “Film Score” list, but I couldn’t resist making it a list of its own; it is among my favorite music, of any genre, ever composed.

Finally, here is a collection of my favorites. This includes works that could fit in all of the categories above, but is not limited to them. There are some chamber music arrangements (String Quartet, Piano Trio, Piano Quartet, etc.).

From the Museical Sphere,

Michael Rosin