R.I.P. Ryuichi Sakamoto, Oscar-winning composer

Influential composer, musician, and producer Ryuichi Sakamoto—who won an Oscar for composing the score for 1987’s The Last Emperor along with David Byrne and Cong Su—has died following a lengthy battle with cancer. Sakamoto also won a BAFTA, a Grammy, and two Golden Globes, and he was a member of pioneering electronic music group Yellow Magic Orchestra. The news was confirmed by Sakamoto’s social media account, which posted this morning that he had died on March 28. Sakamoto was 71.

Sakamoto was born in Tokyo in 1952, and The Hollywood Reporter notes that he was “surrounded by music, art, and culture from a young age”—he even began playing piano when he was only three and attended “the same famously liberal and creative preschool as Yoko Ono.” He began working with electronic music in the ‘70s while at Tokyo University, and he formed Yellow Magic Orchestra with Haruomi Hosono and Yukihiro Takahashi in 1978. The groundbreaking electropop group gained international acclaim and has left a longstanding impression on various genres (including electronic, of course, but also hip hop and pop).