Seattle Photographer Daniel Sheehan
RYUICHI SAKAMOTO | Jazz Photography
The amazing music of Ryuichi Sakamoto was wonderful in concert Saturday night at the Moore Theatre as the Earshot Jazz Festival presented along with the Seattle Theatre Group the Japanese musician celebrating his recent double-CD release on Decca label. Seattle is one of only ten cities Sakamoto has selected for his rare North American tour.
“The two-volume release, Out of Noise and Playing the Piano, presents a unique insight into Ryuichi Sakamoto’s music. While it is nearly impossible to categorize Sakamoto’s work into one ganger, two threads have been ever-present in his music since his days as composition student at Tokyo University of the Arts in the early 1970’s: classical piano and experimentation.
Among Sakamoto’s early influences were turn of the 20th century French composer Claude Debussy and German electronica pioneers Kraftwerk. As a young composer Ryuichi Sakamoto was already fascinated with blending classical melodic touch with technology and electronic beats.
In late 1970’s Sakamoto himself became a force in early electronica as a member of Yellow Magic Orchestra (one of the first Japanese acts to break into European and American scenes).
Beyond Yellow Magic Orchestra, Ryuichi Sakamoto added another dimension to his music. Composing a score to 1983 film Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence, Sakamoto found one more way to explore music. Subsequently, he composed music for a number of films, winning a Grammy and an Oscar in 1987 for the best original score for The Last Emperor (Sakamoto co-wrote the score with David Byrne and Cong Su).
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Click here for the complete schedule for the rest of the upcoming shows at the 2010 Earshot Jazz Festival
Jazz Photography by Seattle photographer Daniel Sheehan creating portraits for publications and a Seattle Wedding Photographer with a photojournalist style.