Ryuichi Sakamoto's memoir "Music Makes You Free"

The famous Japanese composer Ryuichi Sakamoto passed away on March 28, 2023.  In memory of him, I brought out an essay I wrote seven years ago after reading his memoir. I hope you like it.

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When I was in China this summer (2016), I saw Ryuichi Sakamoto's memoir "Music Makes You Free" in a bookstore. Sakamoto is the music composer for the movie "The Last Emperor" thus is familiar to many Chinese readers. Flipping through the book I found I liked the content, the translation, and the simple and exquisite layout on a quick browse. I bought it and read it in on my way back to the USA, I wasn’t disappointed. Indeed it is a wonderful read.

Sakamoto's book describes his grow-up years in youth and adulthood, particularly in relation to music composition, conveys to us his emotions and thoughts in plain language from the experience.

For example, the teaching approach of Tokuyama, his first music teacher when he was young, is very interesting. Tokuyama gave each student a copy of the score of Beethoven's "Ninth Symphony", and let the children find the main theme on the score while listening to it. “Listen to it again after you find it, and see what instrument is used to present the main melody. Circle with colored pens.”

Think about it, is a child taught this way more likely to understand and appreciate the music, than being forced to play a piano piece repeatedly? Isn’t the child more likely to become a great composer or conductor than an ordinary player?

Perhaps because of this kind of training, Sakamoto's hearing is very sensitive and the ability to understand music is more “advanced”. When he listened to the Beatles' songs, for example, he didn't simply feel they sound good, but thought more like why the chords here and there are so good, and noticed that Debussy's songs also have such chords. Discoveries like that “made me very excited”, he said, "I usually dare not say a word in front of my father, but because I was so excited, I just dragged him over in front of the stereo and played the Beatles songs for him. The excited look of the child, and the love between father and son can be clearly seen.

In addition, "I always ask everyone, do you know the Beatles? Those who know fall into the category of friends, and those who don't I would ignore." What a typical young boy!

Later, to keep in fashion of the young boys at the time, he fell in love with basketball and gave up music, but he thought about music all the time and finally realized: "I love music so much!"

And we know, in high school and even in college, Sakamoto was not sure what he would do in the future. He just followed his interest in listening to music, reading literature, and participating in student sports, but that did not prevent him from becoming a great musician later on. It reminds me that many Chinese parents, worry about their children so much, and sometimes request children to practice examination questions that even a Ph.D would take hours to solve.  Parents get together and talk about their children's education all the time. With such parents, how much time do the children have to discover their true passion?

Let’s look at more about his thoughts on music and ways of thinking now. In this book, Sakamoto has many interesting and thought-provoking ideas.

Once Sakamoto’s teacher Sanzen asked him: “How do you think you understand the shape of things?” Sakamoto had read some arts theory and said, “you need to know light and shadow to know shape, even better with color.  If you lack understanding on light and color, you can’t recognize shape.”

After finishing the speaking, he realized that the teacher was trying to tell him that there must be light, shadow and color to define the music shape, or form, otherwise there is no way to recognize form or develop his music’s form. The teacher told him tactfully that his music lacked light shade and color!

Simple yet profound warning! People should have colors in their lives, otherwise they cannot be distinguished in form.  One of the many only.

Sakamoto talked about many people who influenced him. That makes the book fascinating. These people are not always musicians. "My frequent communication with people outside the music field is not because I have any self-motivation or based on any strategy, I simply believe that for anything that comes to me, I should welcome and approach it diligently and see what it will lead to.  A lot of such events unrelated to music come to me, and I get to meet all kinds of people. Luckily they provide me with excellent experience.”

"The philosopher Omori Shozo and I compiled the content of our several conversations into a book and published it. Soon I met Yoshimoto Takaaki and published a book with him. Akira Asada and Nakazawa, known as the leader of the New Academy, I have a good relationship with Shinichi and Karatani Hiroto... (These people) are all cutting-edge modern thinkers, and it's unbelievable that I can talk to them...I think through music I absorbe a lot from other fields... I can use my knowledge or feel of music to understand their main points. When talking to them, I will suddenly feel that I understand a certain concept, and then I can cut into the mode of communicating with them.  I guess it must be because I have thought about or actually done similar things in music in the past... Meeting many people who are active in the front line will certainly have an impact on my work. And after talking with them, I have my answer to these influences through music."

What a young man with an active mind!

Sakamoto mentioned many people, and I will only talk about one person particularly who writes music with mathematics.  That is very interesting to me.  Hi is Iannis Xenakis. We all know the close connection between music and mathematics, especially Bach's pieces, but these connections are deterministic mathematics, that is, some cyclical permutations and combinations. But Xenakis  uses group theory and probability theory to write. Sounds weird and boring, right? Not really, I listened to Zeneski's music and think it is not as monotonous and “ugly” as people may imagine, but very shocking and unique. Of course, the feeling of music is very personal.

Perhaps abstract paintings can also be done with group theory and probability theory!

I do share some affinities with him.  For example, Sakamoto said: "The indifference of New York to people actually makes me quite comfortable. In New York, it is not so much that I cannot rely on any organization, it is better to say that New York is a city that does not easily accept anyone. However, I grew up hating being restricted by group restraints, and in this sense, I feel relieved staying in New York."

Seeing what he said above, I thought, I understand him.  Even in China, isn’t it why I like Shanghai better than the Imperial Capital? I even also wrote similar words in my essay "A Love of Two Cities: Shanghai and London", in it I said that "the large and small government offices in Beijing made me, a person who pursues freedom, feel thorns on my back and uncomfortable. In Shanghai, I seemed to hide in a sea of ​​people, I feel very comfortable.”

Similarly, there are many descriptions, although about music or his experience, are also worth thinking about, or making me smiling like a complicit. for example:

"Energy Flow got a huge response by accident, (but this song) took me about five minutes to write all together. However, this single sold a million copies. Therefore, I I realized that... the idea of ​​making something as much as you want is meaningless, and works that are completed without thinking too much can be the most popular.”

Is it really that accidental? Of course not, Sakamoto's obsession with music and practice is obvious to the degree that he sometimes forgot sleep and food. But I admit I have to ponder "the idea of ​​making something as much as you want is meaningless, and works that are done without thinking about anything can be the most popular!"

But any way, music makes life free and refreshes the spirit. When I do a lot of things that I like, I feel the inspiration of music, the will power of music, as Sakamoto said: "The so-called rock style, in addition to the elements of rhythm pattern and musical tension, also has chord progression. That is, from one certain chord to another chord, giving people a strong rock atmosphere. People listening to rock naturally want to shake and dance with their bodies."