Ryuichi Sakamoto was an award winning Japanese composer, record producer, and actor best known for the soundtrack for the 1983 film Merry Christmas, Mr Lawrence co-starring in it with David Bowie. The track won him a Bafta for best film music. Sakamoto attended Tokyo’s University of the Arts to study music composition. In 1978 he formed Yellow Magic Orchestra with Haruomi “Harry” Hosono and Yukihiro Takahashi. The group released eight studio albums during their original lifespan with and three ... moreRyuichi Sakamoto was an award winning Japanese composer, record producer, and actor best known for the soundtrack for the 1983 film Merry Christmas, Mr Lawrence co-starring in it with David Bowie. The track won him a Bafta for best film music. Sakamoto attended Tokyo’s University of the Arts to study music composition. In 1978 he formed Yellow Magic Orchestra with Haruomi “Harry” Hosono and Yukihiro Takahashi. The group released eight studio albums during their original lifespan with and three of them reaching No 1 in Japan. YMO disbanded in 1984 but they occasionally got back together for recording and live performances. Sakamoto won an Academy Award along fellow composers David Byrne and Cong Su for his soundtrack to Bernardo Bertolucci’s The Last Emperor, in which he also had an acting role. He also worked on The Sheltering Sky, Little Buddha, The Handmaid’s Tale, Tacones Lejanos and Wild Palms just to name a few. He was a recipient of numerous awards like the Golden Globe Award for Best Original Score, and Grammy Award for Best Score Soundtrack Album for a Motion Picture, Television or Other Visual Media for The Last Emperor. Sakamoto won the Golden Pine Award for Lifetime Achievement in 2013.
