Ryuichi Sakamoto was at the forefront of electronica long before the term was minted. In 1978 the Japanese musician founded the Yellow Magic Orchestra and soon branched out into film scores (his most famous was for the David Bowie movie Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence).
Sakamoto’s latest effort in that field was for the film Silk, directed by the superb Canadian director Francois Girard, whose previous work included the documentary Thirty-Two Short Films About Glenn Gould and the Oscar-winning feature Red Violin. For Silk, Sakomoto drew from a wide and non-electronic palette, echoing the piano music of Debussy and George Winston and moody symphonic movements reminiscent of Samuel Barber. That Sakomoto’s music is enjoyable, even modestly compelling, standing alone without the images it was meant to accompany, is testimony to Sakamoto’s merits as composer, performer and arranger.
The soundtrack CD was released by Silva Screen Records.
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