1. 久石 譲 (Joe Hisaishi)
Japanese composer, band-master, pianist, lyricist, Joe Hisaishi’s talent is largely recognized around the world and is probably not the one most in need of public recognition. I still wanted to mention him because it’s safe to say that he has made some of all time favourite movie soundtracks.
Working very closely with Studio Ghibli and more precisely with Miyazaki, he composed the soundtrack of most of his movies, featuring all time masterpieces such as “Nausicaa Of The Valley Of The Wind”, “Princess Mononoke”, “Castle In The Sky”, “Howl’s Moving Castle”, “Ponyo” and many more. He also worked with Takahata composing the soundtrack of “The Tale Of The Princess Kaguya”, or with Kitano on “Sonatine”, “Brothers” and “Dolls”.
In the 2000s, his career took an international turn working on movies from France, Hong Kong or Korea.
Such a success does not come as a surprise to those that already know his music. How to even give his music the description it deserves?
All I can say is that it is majestic, with an incredible ability to transform emotions into melodies which will make you remember all the beauty and poesy there is in the world. It is so right every time, Hisaishi never fails at bringing you in the story he’s telling.
9 soundtrack composers for diversity in representation
written by Lou Touyarou
2. 菅野 よう子 (Yoko Kanno)
Yoko Kanno is a Japanese composer, mainly known for her work in animation, especially for the soundtrack of the brilliant anime and movies Cowboy Bebop realized by Shinichiro Watanabe, definitely a must watch. She has worked as compositor but also leading the band “The Seatbelts'' founded on purpose for the creation of the soundtrack.
The soundtrack has an interesting variety of genres going from jazz to rock, with some blues from time to time. It can be very energetic, with a lot of trumpets and fast rhythmics, or calmer with melodies from a lonely saxophone, guitar chords of a gentle summer night, combinations that represent very well the different emotions you can feel when watching Cowboy Bebop.
She has also worked on the soundtrack of animes such as Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone, Macross Plus also realized by Watanabe and many more. Her soundtracks are very different from one movie to another, it feels like she adapts completely to the universe of the movie she is working on and shows an impressive versatility in her creations.
Yoko Kanno is a Japanese composer, mainly known for her work in animation, especially for the soundtrack of the brilliant anime and movies Cowboy Bebop realized by Shinichiro Watanabe, definitely a must watch. She has worked as compositor but also leading the band “The Seatbelts'' founded on purpose for the creation of the soundtrack.
The soundtrack has an interesting variety of genres going from jazz to rock, with some blues from time to time. It can be very energetic, with a lot of trumpets and fast rhythmics, or calmer with melodies from a lonely saxophone, guitar chords of a gentle summer night, combinations that represent very well the different emotions you can feel when watching Cowboy Bebop.
She has also worked on the soundtrack of animes such as Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone, Macross Plus also realized by Watanabe and many more. Her soundtracks are very different from one movie to another, it feels like she adapts completely to the universe of the movie she is working on and shows an impressive versatility in her creations.
3. இளையராஜா (Ilaiyaraaja)
Composer, actor, scenarist, lyricist, instrumentalist, Ilaiyaraaja is known for his impact on the Tamil movie industry and his intense creativity having composed soundtracks for more than a 1000 movies (yes, you read it, a 1000) more or less equivalent to the creation of three songs a day.
He was one of the first Indian composers to blend influences of traditional Indian and Tamil music into Western classical music but his music goes way further than that aspect. Everytime I went to listen to his music I felt like I was listening to a different artist. Sometimes made of echoey voices over rhythmics reminiscent of very old school rap, sometimes what you would imagine as the typical Bollywood music, sometimes with funky synthesizers sounding like Indian 70s disco.
It gave me the feeling I was only scratching the surface of something big, the music of someone that has undoubtedly changed the music industry in India although completely overlooked by the rest of the world. According to musicologist P. Greene, Ilaiyaraaja's "deep understanding of so many different styles of music allowed him to create syncretic pieces of music combining very different musical idioms in unified, coherent musical statements"
I very much recommend getting lost in his music and all the compilations, links and videos there are available because it is absolutely fascinating, and feels like opening a door across time.
Composer, actor, scenarist, lyricist, instrumentalist, Ilaiyaraaja is known for his impact on the Tamil movie industry and his intense creativity having composed soundtracks for more than a 1000 movies (yes, you read it, a 1000) more or less equivalent to the creation of three songs a day.
He was one of the first Indian composers to blend influences of traditional Indian and Tamil music into Western classical music but his music goes way further than that aspect. Everytime I went to listen to his music I felt like I was listening to a different artist. Sometimes made of echoey voices over rhythmics reminiscent of very old school rap, sometimes what you would imagine as the typical Bollywood music, sometimes with funky synthesizers sounding like Indian 70s disco.
It gave me the feeling I was only scratching the surface of something big, the music of someone that has undoubtedly changed the music industry in India although completely overlooked by the rest of the world. According to musicologist P. Greene, Ilaiyaraaja's "deep understanding of so many different styles of music allowed him to create syncretic pieces of music combining very different musical idioms in unified, coherent musical statements"
I very much recommend getting lost in his music and all the compilations, links and videos there are available because it is absolutely fascinating, and feels like opening a door across time.
4. Angela Morley
Angela Morley is a British composer and bandmaster, but is also the first transgender person to be nominated for an Oscar. She has worked as orchestrator and ghost-writer on the soundtracks of huge productions such as E.T., Star Wars, Schindler’s list, Home Alone or Superman. Besides her collaborations, she also created soundtracks in her own rights, notably for movies such as The Watership Down, Captain Nemo and the Underwater city or Madam X.
Her music dates back to the beginning of the 50s, which explains her classical approach, always composed of majestic melodies performed by an orchestra. I find her compositions very touching, there is something that I cannot precisely pinpoint, but there is something in her music that carries you away, making you swing to the rhythm of the violins and throwing you back to the orchestral music of the past century.
Angela Morley is a British composer and bandmaster, but is also the first transgender person to be nominated for an Oscar. She has worked as orchestrator and ghost-writer on the soundtracks of huge productions such as E.T., Star Wars, Schindler’s list, Home Alone or Superman. Besides her collaborations, she also created soundtracks in her own rights, notably for movies such as The Watership Down, Captain Nemo and the Underwater city or Madam X.
Her music dates back to the beginning of the 50s, which explains her classical approach, always composed of majestic melodies performed by an orchestra. I find her compositions very touching, there is something that I cannot precisely pinpoint, but there is something in her music that carries you away, making you swing to the rhythm of the violins and throwing you back to the orchestral music of the past century.
5. 坂本 龍一 (Ryuichi Sakamoto)
Before evolving in his solo career, Sakamoto is a member of the band Yellow Magic Orchestra also known as YMO, composed of Sakamoto, Haruomi Hosono and Yukuhiro Takahashi. The band is largely influenced by artists such as Kraftwek, using a lot of synthesizers, creating more and more music from computers, and are considered to have importantly contributed to the development of synthpop across the world.
Next to YMO, Sakamoto evolves in his solo career turning away from synthpop, trying out very different styles. His release of 1980 "B-2 Unit", with the song "Riot in Lagos" has had a tremendous impact on the music industry, influencing artists such as Afrika Bambaata or Kurtis Mantronik. He collaborates with a lot of artists, including repeated collaboration with the German electronic music producer, Alva Noto for example, growing more experimental over the years.
Sakamoto also composes many movie soundtracks, the most famous ones being for Furyo (Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence) of Nagisa Oshima with a very touching theme played at the piano, where he also plays as an actor along side David Bowie. He also composed the music of The Last Emperor of Bernado Bertolucci (winning both Golden Globe and Grammy Awards), or The Revenant of Alejandro Gonzales Inarritu once more, coming as the result of one of his collaborations with Alva Noto.
Before evolving in his solo career, Sakamoto is a member of the band Yellow Magic Orchestra also known as YMO, composed of Sakamoto, Haruomi Hosono and Yukuhiro Takahashi. The band is largely influenced by artists such as Kraftwek, using a lot of synthesizers, creating more and more music from computers, and are considered to have importantly contributed to the development of synthpop across the world.
Next to YMO, Sakamoto evolves in his solo career turning away from synthpop, trying out very different styles. His release of 1980 "B-2 Unit", with the song "Riot in Lagos" has had a tremendous impact on the music industry, influencing artists such as Afrika Bambaata or Kurtis Mantronik. He collaborates with a lot of artists, including repeated collaboration with the German electronic music producer, Alva Noto for example, growing more experimental over the years.
Sakamoto also composes many movie soundtracks, the most famous ones being for Furyo (Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence) of Nagisa Oshima with a very touching theme played at the piano, where he also plays as an actor along side David Bowie. He also composed the music of The Last Emperor of Bernado Bertolucci (winning both Golden Globe and Grammy Awards), or The Revenant of Alejandro Gonzales Inarritu once more, coming as the result of one of his collaborations with Alva Noto.
6. Fatima Al Qadiri
Fatima Al Qadiri is a musician and composer originally from Kuwait and born in Senegal. She composed in 2019 the soundtrack of the movie “Atlantics” directed by Mati Diop. It particularly caught my attention because of its peculiar atmosphere, very ambient, sounding almost surnatural. The movie deals with issues such as immigration, grief, class struggle and you can feel the tragedy of these issues through the music. There is a sort of long, heavy but also beautiful sadness coming out of the soundtrack, and made me realize that it is quite rare to find soundtracks with such an electronic sound to them.
She has also released a few albums on the British music label Hyperdub, and her 3rd release, "Medieval Femme", is planned for the 14th of May. According to the description written by Hyperdub "Medieval Femme invokes a simulated daydream through the metaphor of an Islamic garden, at the border between depression and desire, where the present temporarily dissolves, leaving only past and future."
Listening to "Malaak", one of the songs of the album, you re-encounter the dreamy ambient atmosphere found in the soundtrack of Atlantics, and ensures a promising release for Fatima Al Qadiri.
Fatima Al Qadiri is a musician and composer originally from Kuwait and born in Senegal. She composed in 2019 the soundtrack of the movie “Atlantics” directed by Mati Diop. It particularly caught my attention because of its peculiar atmosphere, very ambient, sounding almost surnatural. The movie deals with issues such as immigration, grief, class struggle and you can feel the tragedy of these issues through the music. There is a sort of long, heavy but also beautiful sadness coming out of the soundtrack, and made me realize that it is quite rare to find soundtracks with such an electronic sound to them.
She has also released a few albums on the British music label Hyperdub, and her 3rd release, "Medieval Femme", is planned for the 14th of May. According to the description written by Hyperdub "Medieval Femme invokes a simulated daydream through the metaphor of an Islamic garden, at the border between depression and desire, where the present temporarily dissolves, leaving only past and future."
Listening to "Malaak", one of the songs of the album, you re-encounter the dreamy ambient atmosphere found in the soundtrack of Atlantics, and ensures a promising release for Fatima Al Qadiri.
7. Miriam Cutler
Miriam Cutler is an American soundtrack composer, her passion for documentary leading her to mainly compose for non-fiction movies. She has created soundtracks for documentaries such as "RGB", focusing on the life of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the second female member of the US Supreme Court, or for "Vito", portraying the life of Vito Russso, an activist for the LGBTQ+ community and film scholar, to only cite a few. She has been a member of film festival juries numerous times and her love for jazz has pushed her to work with jazz legends such as Joe Williams, Nina Simone or Marlena Shaw. In 2014, she also co-founded the Alliance for Women Film Composers, aiming for more visibility and representation for women in the field.
I find it really interesting to listen to her music through the prism of documentaries, I don’t know why but knowing that the music is attached to a documentary, showing real events or explaining facts, somehow being linked with reality makes me hear the music slightly differently; and it makes me wonder if the process of creation of soundtracks is different from the ones of fiction or nonfiction movies.
Miriam Cutler is an American soundtrack composer, her passion for documentary leading her to mainly compose for non-fiction movies. She has created soundtracks for documentaries such as "RGB", focusing on the life of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the second female member of the US Supreme Court, or for "Vito", portraying the life of Vito Russso, an activist for the LGBTQ+ community and film scholar, to only cite a few. She has been a member of film festival juries numerous times and her love for jazz has pushed her to work with jazz legends such as Joe Williams, Nina Simone or Marlena Shaw. In 2014, she also co-founded the Alliance for Women Film Composers, aiming for more visibility and representation for women in the field.
I find it really interesting to listen to her music through the prism of documentaries, I don’t know why but knowing that the music is attached to a documentary, showing real events or explaining facts, somehow being linked with reality makes me hear the music slightly differently; and it makes me wonder if the process of creation of soundtracks is different from the ones of fiction or nonfiction movies.
8. Herbie Hancock
You might know Herbie Hancock for his impressive career as a pianist, really influential in the jazz sphere, also playing for some time in the Miles Davis Quintet (Miles Davis who also composed a gorgeous soundtrack for “Ascenseur pour L'échafaud”), but also for his famous hip-hop hits like "Rockit". Starting his career playing with Davis, it is later on with his own band and album “Head hunters” that his career exploded. His creations were innovative in the sense that they were blending jazz with influences from different styles, such as soul, funk, electronic music, hip-hop. His music was extremely diverse from one album to another, and allowed him to reach a very wide audience.
However we often tend to forget that he has also worked on different movie soundtracks, one of them being for “Round’ Midnight” a beautiful, slow pace jazz theme for which he received an Oscar for best music, but also for Blow Up, recorded on Blue Note, a famous jazz music label. He also composed the music of "Colors", completely breaking away from jazz, coming up with a soundtrack largely influenced by hip-hop, starting to grow more and more popular at the time.
Like many of the artists mentioned before, Hancock had a huge career coming up with a lot of innovative music, and requires you to go listen to different album of his to really understand the diversity and the impact of his music.
You might know Herbie Hancock for his impressive career as a pianist, really influential in the jazz sphere, also playing for some time in the Miles Davis Quintet (Miles Davis who also composed a gorgeous soundtrack for “Ascenseur pour L'échafaud”), but also for his famous hip-hop hits like "Rockit". Starting his career playing with Davis, it is later on with his own band and album “Head hunters” that his career exploded. His creations were innovative in the sense that they were blending jazz with influences from different styles, such as soul, funk, electronic music, hip-hop. His music was extremely diverse from one album to another, and allowed him to reach a very wide audience.
However we often tend to forget that he has also worked on different movie soundtracks, one of them being for “Round’ Midnight” a beautiful, slow pace jazz theme for which he received an Oscar for best music, but also for Blow Up, recorded on Blue Note, a famous jazz music label. He also composed the music of "Colors", completely breaking away from jazz, coming up with a soundtrack largely influenced by hip-hop, starting to grow more and more popular at the time.
Like many of the artists mentioned before, Hancock had a huge career coming up with a lot of innovative music, and requires you to go listen to different album of his to really understand the diversity and the impact of his music.
9. Wendy Carlos
Wendy Carlos is an American composer and one of the first openly transgender women in the electronic music industry. Studying music and physics at Brown University, and then working at the Electronic Music Center of Columbia University, she also has contributed to the development of the Moog modular synthesizer. Working closely with the engineer behind the machine, Robert Moog, she was providing a lot of feedback on how the machine could be improved. This was the first synthesizer to be sold for a commercial purpose, accessible to the public.
Pioneer in the electronic music field that was very much overlooked by the public at that time and perceived as completely deprived of any commercial purpose, she contributed to the acceptance and appreciation of that new music genre. She managed to do this through her many solo albums, but also through the soundtracks that she has created, working quite closely with Stanley Kubrick, composing the music for two of his movies, “A Clockwork Orange” and “The Shining”, alongside Rachel Elkind. She has also composed the groundbreaking soundtrack of “Tron” directed by Steven Lisberger. Her compositions were mainly oriented towards electronic music, using different kinds of synthesizers, but also incorporating orchestras and more classical elements, which contributed to the popularization of her music.
Wendy Carlos is an American composer and one of the first openly transgender women in the electronic music industry. Studying music and physics at Brown University, and then working at the Electronic Music Center of Columbia University, she also has contributed to the development of the Moog modular synthesizer. Working closely with the engineer behind the machine, Robert Moog, she was providing a lot of feedback on how the machine could be improved. This was the first synthesizer to be sold for a commercial purpose, accessible to the public.
Pioneer in the electronic music field that was very much overlooked by the public at that time and perceived as completely deprived of any commercial purpose, she contributed to the acceptance and appreciation of that new music genre. She managed to do this through her many solo albums, but also through the soundtracks that she has created, working quite closely with Stanley Kubrick, composing the music for two of his movies, “A Clockwork Orange” and “The Shining”, alongside Rachel Elkind. She has also composed the groundbreaking soundtrack of “Tron” directed by Steven Lisberger. Her compositions were mainly oriented towards electronic music, using different kinds of synthesizers, but also incorporating orchestras and more classical elements, which contributed to the popularization of her music.