He attended university when Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music, where he earned the B.The. within music composition & an M.The. using favorite emphasis in each electronic & ethnic music. Sakamoto recorded his number one solo album around 1978, which included a songs "Thousand Knives" and "The End of Asia".

In a equivalent instance, Sakamoto joined as a member of the internationally successful Japanese synth-rock/synth J-Pop trio Yellow Magic Orchestra, along with co-founders Haruomi Hosono and Yukihiro Takahashi. the band following a British top Twenty hit by using "Computer Game" in the late 1970s (and come besides remembered for "Technopolis", "Firecracker" & "Tong Poo"), & were the germinal influence on the acid house and techno movements of the late 1980s and early 1990s. Sakamoto has collaborated by using David Sylvian on a total of singles and most of Sylvian's albums. He has as well collaborated sustaining, among others, Fennesz, Towa Tei (originally from a class action Deee-Lite), Thomas Dolby, Youssou N'Dour, Roddy Frame (frontperson for Aztec Camera), Iggy Pop (originally from The Stooges) and Caetano Veloso.

He appeared in the 1983 Nagisa Oshima film Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence alongside British rock singer David Bowie; he also wrote the film's musical score, and the theme song "Forbidden Colours," sung by Sylvian, became a minor hit. As a long instance fan of Virginia Astley's music he produced her 1986 album Hope In The Darkened Heart which involved David Sylvian as a guest. He won a Academy Award for his score to the 1987 Bernardo Bertolucci film The Last Emperor. He has likewise written soundtracks for Bertolucci's 1993 film The Little Buddha, Pedro Almodóvar's 1992 film High Heels, Oliver Stone's 1993 television series Wild Palms, John Maybury's 1998 film, Love Is the Devil: Study for a Portrait of Francis Bacon, and Brian De Palma's 1998 film Snake Eyes and 2002 film Femme Fatale.

Inside 1992, Sakamoto composed a score of the opening ceremony for the Summer Olympic Games in Barcelona, Spain, telecast live to an audience of on top the billion viewers.

Within 1998 Italian ethnomusicologist Massimo Milano published Ryuichi Sakamoto. Conversazioni, a collection of essays and conversations.

Recently, Finnish cellular telephone manufacturer Nokia hired Sakamoto to compose ring and alert tones for their high-prevent phone, a Nokia 8800.

Sakamoto was married to the Japanese piano player & singer Akiko Yano, collaborating with her in occasionally of her recordings. It divorced around 2002.

He is also referred to as the critic of copyright law, arguing that it is antiquated in the information age.

Discography (Albums)

Thousand Knives (1978) B2-Unit (1980) Finale (1983) Musical Cyclopaedia (1984) Esperanto (1985) Futurista (1986) Neo Geo (1987) Beauty (1989) Heart Beat (1992) Sweetly Retaliation (1994) Smoochy (1995) Discord (1997) BTTB (1998) Life (1999) In The Lobby At G.E.H. Around London (2001) Comica (2002) Elephantism (2002) Chasm (2004)