was a Japanese
composer
A composer is a person who writes music. The term is especially used to indicate composers of Western classical music, or those who are composers by occupation. Many composers are, or were, also skilled performers of music.
Etymology and Defi ...
,
conductor, and
orchestrator
Orchestration is the study or practice of writing music for an orchestra (or, more loosely, for any musical ensemble, such as a concert band) or of adapting music composed for another medium for an orchestra. Also called "instrumentation", orch ...
. He was best known for composing the music for the ''
Dragon Quest
previously published as ''Dragon Warrior'' in North America until 2005, is a franchise of Japanese role-playing video games created by Armor Project (Yuji Horii), Bird Studio (Akira Toriyama) and Sugiyama Kobo (Koichi Sugiyama) to its publi ...
'' franchise, along with several other
video game
Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, controller, keyboard, or motion sensing device to generate visual feedback. This fee ...
s,
anime
is Traditional animation, hand-drawn and computer animation, computer-generated animation originating from Japan. Outside of Japan and in English, ''anime'' refers specifically to animation produced in Japan. However, in Japan and in Japane ...
, film, and television shows. Classically trained, Sugiyama was considered a major inspiration for other Japanese game music composers and was active from the 1960s until his death from
septic shock
Septic shock is a potentially fatal medical condition that occurs when sepsis, which is organ injury or damage in response to infection, leads to dangerously low blood pressure and abnormalities in cellular metabolism. The Third International Con ...
in 2021.
Sugiyama was also a council member of the
Japanese Society for Rights of Authors, Composers, and Publishers (JASRAC), board member of the
Japan Institute for National Fundamentals
The or Kokkiken (国基研) is a public and foreign policy think tank in Tokyo, Japan, privately funded and founded in December 2007 by Yoshiko Sakurai.
Overview
On its English website about JINF: "We take great pride in our time-honored Japa ...
, and honorary chairman of the Japanese
Backgammon
Backgammon is a two-player board game played with counters and dice on tables boards. It is the most widespread Western member of the large family of tables games, whose ancestors date back nearly 5,000 years to the regions of Mesopotamia and Pe ...
Society. Prior to his death, he was given the
Order of the Rising Sun
The is a Japanese order, established in 1875 by Emperor Meiji. The Order was the first national decoration awarded by the Japanese government, created on 10 April 1875 by decree of the Council of State. The badge features rays of sunlight ...
and was named a
Person of Cultural Merit
is an official Japanese recognition and honor which is awarded annually to select people who have made outstanding cultural contributions. This distinction is intended to play a role as a part of a system of support measures for the promotion of ...
by the Japanese government. He also engaged in politics and activism, such as the promotion of
Japanese nationalism
is a form of nationalism that asserts the belief that the Japanese are a monolithic nation with a single immutable culture, and promotes the cultural unity of the Japanese. Over the last two centuries, it has encompassed a broad range of ideas a ...
and the denial of
Japanese war crimes
The Empire of Japan committed war crimes in many Asian-Pacific countries during the period of Japanese militarism, Japanese imperialism, primarily during the Second Sino-Japanese War, Second Sino-Japanese and Pacific Wars. These incidents have b ...
.
Career
Early life and television career
Sugiyama was born in Tokyo, Japan, on April 11, 1931. While growing up, Sugiyama's home was filled with music, which ultimately inspired his passion. In high school, he began to write various small musical works.
He attended the
University of Tokyo
, abbreviated as or UTokyo, is a public research university located in Bunkyō, Tokyo, Japan. Established in 1877, the university was the first Imperial University and is currently a Top Type university of the Top Global University Project by ...
and graduated with full honors in 1958. He then went into the reporting and entertainment sections of
Nippon Cultural Broadcasting
is a Japanese radio station in Tokyo which broadcasts to the Kanto area. It is one of the two flagship radio stations of National Radio Network (NRN) (the other station is ) and is a member of the Fujisankei Communications Group.
History
The ...
.
He also joined
Fuji TV
JOCX-DTV (channel 8), branded as and colloquially known as CX, is a Japanese television station based in Odaiba, Minato, Tokyo, Japan. Owned and operated by the it is the key station of the Fuji News Network (FNN) and the Fuji Network Sys ...
as a director that same year.
He left the station in 1965 to become a freelance director but had begun concentrating solely on musical composition and orchestration by 1968.
During the late 1970s and early 1980s, Sugiyama composed for several musicals,
commercials
A television advertisement (also called a television commercial, TV commercial, commercial, spot, television spot, TV spot, advert, television advert, TV advert, television ad, TV ad or simply an ad) is a span of television programming produce ...
, pop artists,
animated movies
Animation is a method by which still figures are manipulated to appear as moving images. In traditional animation, images are drawn or painted by hand on transparent celluloid sheets to be photographed and exhibited on film. Today, most anim ...
, and television shows, such as ''
Science Ninja Team Gatchaman: The Movie'', ''
The Sea Prince and the Fire Child
is a 1981 Japanese anime film by Sanrio, based on a story by Shintaro Tsuji. It is said to be a loose retelling of ''Romeo and Juliet'', itself a European version of many tales of star-crossed lovers in a variety of cultures and eras. In this ...
'', and ''
Cyborg 009
is a Japanese science fiction manga created by Shotaro Ishinomori. It was serialized in many different Japanese magazines, including '' Monthly Shōnen King'', ''Weekly Shōnen Magazine'', ''Shōnen Big Comic'', '' COM'', '' ...
''. He also assisted
Riichiro Manabe
(November 9, 1924 – January 29, 2015) was a Japanese composer. He wrote scores for numerous science fiction, horror, and kaiju films.
Filmography
* '' Suzaki paradise: Akashingō'' (洲崎パラダイス 赤信号 Suzaki paradaisu Ak ...
with the composition for ''
Godzilla vs. Hedorah'', composing the record single of the soundtrack and conducting for some of the tracks.
''Dragon Quest'' and other video games
Sugiyama's first contact with
Enix
was a Japanese video game publisher that produced video games, anime and manga. Enix is known for publishing the ''Dragon Quest'' series of role-playing video games.
The company was founded by Yasuhiro Fukushima on September 22, 1975, as . Th ...
was by a fan letter he wrote them regarding a PC
shogi
, also known as Japanese chess, is a strategy board game for two players. It is one of the most popular board games in Japan and is in the same family of games as Western chess, ''chaturanga, Xiangqi'', Indian chess, and '' janggi''. ''Shōgi'' ...
game in the early 1980s. After Enix's staff overcame the shock of receiving a handwritten postcard from a celebrity of Sugiyama's stature, they were so impressed by his depth of knowledge and appreciation of games that they decided to ask Sugiyama to create music for their games. Sugiyama started composing for the
PC-8801
The , commonly shortened to PC-88, are a brand of Zilog Z80-based 8-bit home computers released by Nippon Electric Company (NEC) in 1981 and primarily sold in Japan.
The PC-8800 series sold extremely well and became one of the three major Japane ...
, and was working for
Enix
was a Japanese video game publisher that produced video games, anime and manga. Enix is known for publishing the ''Dragon Quest'' series of role-playing video games.
The company was founded by Yasuhiro Fukushima on September 22, 1975, as . Th ...
at the time. His first project with the company was the 1985 game ''World Golf''. In 1986, he composed for his first major project, ''
Dragon Quest
previously published as ''Dragon Warrior'' in North America until 2005, is a franchise of Japanese role-playing video games created by Armor Project (Yuji Horii), Bird Studio (Akira Toriyama) and Sugiyama Kobo (Koichi Sugiyama) to its publi ...
''.
His classical score for the game was considered revolutionary for
console
Console may refer to:
Computing and video games
* System console, a physical device to operate a computer
** Virtual console, a user interface for multiple computer consoles on one device
** Command-line interface, a method of interacting with ...
video game music
Video game music (or VGM) is the soundtrack that accompanies video games. Early video game music was once limited to sounds of early sound chips, such as programmable sound generators (PSG) or FM synthesis chips. These limitations have led to ...
.
Sugiyama was the one of the first video game composers to record with a live orchestra. In 1986, the CD, ''Dragon Quest I Symphonic Suite'', was released, utilizing the
London Philharmonic Orchestra
The London Philharmonic Orchestra (LPO) is one of five permanent symphony orchestras based in London. It was founded by the conductors Sir Thomas Beecham and Malcolm Sargent in 1932 as a rival to the existing London Symphony and BBC Symphony ...
to interpret Sugiyama's melodies. The soundtrack's eight melodies (Opening, Castle, Town, Field, Dungeon, Battle, Final Battle, and Ending) set the template for most
role-playing video game
A role-playing video game (commonly referred to as simply a role-playing game or RPG, as well as a computer role-playing game or CRPG) is a video game genre where the player controls the actions of a character (or several party members) immers ...
soundtracks released since then, many of which have been organized in a similar manner.
In 1987, he composed for ''
Dragon Quest II
''Dragon Quest II: Luminaries of the Legendary Line'', titled ''Dragon Warrior II'' when initially localized to North America, is a role-playing video game developed by Chunsoft and published by Enix in 1987 for the Nintendo Entertainment System ...
''. Music from the first two ''Dragon Quest'' games was performed by one of first game music concerts, "Family Classic Concert". It was arranged and conducted by Sugiyama himself and was performed by the Tokyo String Music Combination Playing Group on August 20, 1987, at
Suntory Hall
The is a concert venue in the central Akasaka district of Tokyo, Japan. Part of the Ark Hills complex, it consists of a main concert hall, widely considered one of the finest in the world for its acoustics — indeed Herbert von Karajan called i ...
in Tokyo. "Dragon Quest I Symphonic Suite" and "Dragon Quest II Symphonic Suite" were performed.
He subsequently held eighteen of them all across Japan.
From 1987 to 1990, Sugiyama continued to compose for various other Enix games. In 1991, he introduced a series of video game music concerts, five in all, called the Orchestral Game Concerts, which were performed by the Tokyo City Philharmonic Orchestra and Tokyo Symphony Orchestra. The performances included over eighteen different video game composers, such as
Koji Kondo
is a Japanese music composer, pianist, and music director who works for the video game company Nintendo. He is best known for his numerous contributions to the '' Super Mario'' and ''The Legend of Zelda'' series of video games, among others pr ...
,
Yoko Kanno
is a Japanese composer, arranger and music producer best known for her work on the soundtracks of anime series, television series, live-action films, video games, and advertisements. She was born in Sendai, Miyagi Prefecture, Japan. She has wri ...
,
Nobuo Uematsu
is a Japanese composer and keyboardist best known for his contributions to the ''Final Fantasy'' video game series by Square Enix. A self-taught musician, he began playing the piano at the age of twelve, with English singer-songwriter Elton Jo ...
,
Keiichi Suzuki
is a Japanese musician, singer, and record producer who co-founded the Moonriders, a group that became one of Japan's most innovative rock bands. He is known to audiences outside Japan for his musical contributions to the video games ''Mother'' ...
, as well as Sugiyama himself. These concerts were held from 1991 to 1996; during this time, Sugiyama composed for other video games and arranged for some of them to be performed in the Orchestral Game Concerts.
In September 1995, Sugiyama composed the ''Dragon Quest'' Ballet. It premiered in 1996, and returned in 1997, 1999, 2001, and 2002.
During those years, he also released several ''Dragon Quest'' Symphonic Suites. In late 2004, he finished and released the ''
Dragon Quest VIII
A dragon is a reptilian legendary creature that appears in the folklore of many cultures worldwide. Beliefs about dragons vary considerably through regions, but European dragon, dragons in western cultures since the High Middle Ages have often ...
'' soundtrack. In 2005, Sugiyama was holding a series of concerts in Japan with the
Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra
The , also known as Tokyō (都響), is one of the representative symphony orchestras of Japan. The Orchestra was founded in 1965 by the Tokyo Metropolitan Government, to commemorate the Tokyo Olympics (1964 Summer Olympics).
Currently Kazushi O ...
with music from ''Dragon Quest VIII'', as well as his classic compositions from the past. In August 2005, his music from ''
Dragon Quest
previously published as ''Dragon Warrior'' in North America until 2005, is a franchise of Japanese role-playing video games created by Armor Project (Yuji Horii), Bird Studio (Akira Toriyama) and Sugiyama Kobo (Koichi Sugiyama) to its publi ...
'' was performed live at the European
Symphonic Game Music Concert
The ''Symphonic Game Music Concerts (''shortened to: ''Game Concerts'') are a series of award-winning orchestral video game music concerts first performed in 2003 at the Gewandhaus in Leipzig, Germany, notable for being the longest running and the ...
, marking the first time that his music was performed by a live symphonic concert outside of Japan. Sugiyama also composed the score for ''
Dragon Quest X
''Dragon Quest X: Awakening of the Five Walkers Online'', also known as is a massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) developed and published by Square Enix. It is the tenth mainline entry in the '' Dragon Quest'' series. It was ...
''
and its expansions, as well as ''
Dragon Quest XI
''Dragon Quest XI: Echoes of an Elusive Age'' is a role-playing video game by Square Enix. The eleventh entry in the long-running ''Dragon Quest'' video game series, it was released in Japan for the Nintendo 3DS and PlayStation 4 in July 2017 an ...
''.
[
Throughout his work Sugiyama repeatedly used motifs to maintain a consistency and nostalgic quality in the different installments. Each of the ''Dragon Quest'' games that he worked on included a nearly identical, upbeat theme track titled "Overture". Sugiyama's style of composition has been compared to late ]Baroque
The Baroque (, ; ) is a style of architecture, music, dance, painting, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished in Europe from the early 17th century until the 1750s. In the territories of the Spanish and Portuguese empires including t ...
and early Classical period styles.
Sugiyama's non-work related hobbies
A hobby is considered to be a regular activity that is done for enjoyment, typically during one's leisure time. Hobbies include collecting themed items and objects, engaging in creative and artistic pursuits, playing sports, or pursuing oth ...
included photography, traveling, building model ships, collecting old cameras, and reading
Reading is the process of taking in the sense or meaning of Letter (alphabet), letters, symbols, etc., especially by Visual perception, sight or Somatosensory system, touch.
For educators and researchers, reading is a multifaceted process invo ...
. He has opened a camera section on his website, and also founded his own record label, SUGI Label, in June 2004. Sugiyama also composed the fanfares for the opening and closing of the gates at the Tokyo
Tokyo (; ja, 東京, , ), officially the Tokyo Metropolis ( ja, 東京都, label=none, ), is the capital and largest city of Japan. Formerly known as Edo, its metropolitan area () is the most populous in the world, with an estimated 37.468 ...
and Nakayama Racecourse
is located in Funabashi, Chiba, Japan. It is used for horse racing. It has a capacity of 165,676. It was built in 1990.
Physical attributes
Nakayama Race Course has two grass courses, a dirt course, and a jump course.
The turf's measures 1840 ...
s. He was given the Order of the Rising Sun
The is a Japanese order, established in 1875 by Emperor Meiji. The Order was the first national decoration awarded by the Japanese government, created on 10 April 1875 by decree of the Council of State. The badge features rays of sunlight ...
, 4th Class, by the Japanese government in 2018 before also being named a Person of Cultural Merit
is an official Japanese recognition and honor which is awarded annually to select people who have made outstanding cultural contributions. This distinction is intended to play a role as a part of a system of support measures for the promotion of ...
by them two years later. Sugiyama died from septic shock
Septic shock is a potentially fatal medical condition that occurs when sepsis, which is organ injury or damage in response to infection, leads to dangerously low blood pressure and abnormalities in cellular metabolism. The Third International Con ...
at the age of 90 on September 30, 2021. A television drama played by actor Ken Yasuda detailing Sugiyama's involvement with ''Dragon Quest'' aired on Nippon TV
JOAX-DTV (channel 4), branded as , is the flagship station of the Nippon News Network and the Nippon Television Network System, owned-and-operated by the which is a subsidiary of the certified broadcasting holding company , itself a listed su ...
on August 27, 2022.
Political activities and beliefs
Sugiyama was a Nanjing Massacre denial
Nanjing Massacre denial is the denial of the fact that Imperial Japanese forces murdered hundreds of thousands of Chinese soldiers and civilians in the city of Nanjing during the Second Sino-Japanese War, an extremely controversial episode in th ...
ist, stating that the facts regarding it are "selective in nature". He was one of the signatories on "The Facts", a full-page ad published by ''The Washington Post
''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large nati ...
'' on June 14, 2007, which was written by a number of Japanese politicians and academics in response to the passing of United States House of Representatives House Resolution 121
United States House of Representatives House Resolution 121 () is a Resolution (law), resolution about comfort women which Japanese-American Congressman Mike Honda of California's 15th congressional district introduced to the American House of R ...
, which sought an official apology from the Government of Japan
The Government of Japan consists of legislative, executive and judiciary branches and is based on popular sovereignty. The Government runs under the framework established by the Constitution of Japan, adopted in 1947. It is a unitary state, c ...
regarding their involvement of using "comfort women
Comfort women or comfort girls were women and girls forced into sexual slavery by the Imperial Japanese Army in occupied countries and territories before and during World War II. The term "comfort women" is a translation of the Japanese '' ia ...
", which were women who were used as sexual slaves by Japanese soldiers during World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
. Sugiyama was also a board member of the Japan Institute for National Fundamentals
The or Kokkiken (国基研) is a public and foreign policy think tank in Tokyo, Japan, privately funded and founded in December 2007 by Yoshiko Sakurai.
Overview
On its English website about JINF: "We take great pride in our time-honored Japa ...
.
In 2012, Sugiyama wrote an editorial saying that he thought Japan was in a state of "civil war between Japanese and anti-Japanese". Giving examples, he argued that the Japanese media portrayed acts of patriotism negatively, such as performing the National Anthem of Japan
is the national anthem of Japan. The lyrics are from a ' poem written by an unnamed author in the Heian period (794–1185), and the current melody was chosen in 1880, replacing an unpopular melody composed by John William Fenton eleven years e ...
or raising the Japanese flag
The national flag of Japan is a rectangular white banner bearing a crimson-red circle at its center. This flag is officially called the , but is more commonly known in Japan as the . It embodies the country's sobriquet: the Land of the Rising S ...
. In addition, he thought that the demands of the Japanese anti-nuclear movement
The anti-nuclear movement is a social movement that opposes various nuclear technologies. Some direct action groups, environmental movements, and professional organisations have identified themselves with the movement at the local, nationa ...
, which grew following the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster
The was a nuclear accident in 2011 at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant in Ōkuma, Fukushima, Japan. The proximate cause of the disaster was the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami, which occurred on the afternoon of 11 March 2011 and ...
of 2011, to immediately dismantle all nuclear energy facilities without offering any alternative solutions damaged the country's ability to defend itself.
In 2015, Sugiyama made an appearance on the Japanese Culture Channel Sakura
, also known as simply Channel Sakura, is a Japanese right-wing television channel and Video hosting service, video-sharing website founded in 2004. It is known for its support for conservatism and Japanese nationalism, with its main spokesperson b ...
television program ''Hi Izuru Kuni Yori'' where he was shown agreeing with views shared by Japanese politician Mio Sugita
Mio Sugita (杉田 水脈 ''Sugita Mio'', born April 22, 1967) is a Japanese politician. She is a member of the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan and incumbent member of the House of Representatives for the Proportional Chugoku Block.
Sugita h ...
who said there was no need for LGBT
' is an initialism that stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender. In use since the 1990s, the initialism, as well as some of its common variants, functions as an umbrella term for sexuality and gender identity.
The LGBT term is a ...
education in Japanese schools, as well as dismissing concerns about high suicide rates among the community. Sugiyama added that the lack of children born from LGBT couples was an important topic to discuss, also suggesting that Japan was more empowering to women than South Korea
South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and sharing a Korean Demilitarized Zone, land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed ...
. He later recanted his statement by saying that LGBT couples have existed throughout human history and he supported the use of governments to occasionally help them.
Works
Video games
Film and television
References
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Sugiyama, Koichi
1931 births
2021 deaths
20th-century classical composers
20th-century classical pianists
20th-century conductors (music)
20th-century Japanese composers
20th-century Japanese male musicians
20th-century Japanese pianists
21st-century classical composers
21st-century classical pianists
21st-century conductors (music)
21st-century Japanese composers
21st-century Japanese male musicians
21st-century Japanese pianists
Anime composers
Anti-Korean sentiment in Japan
Conservatism in Japan
Japanese classical composers
Japanese classical pianists
Japanese conductors (music)
Japanese contemporary classical composers
Japanese film score composers
Japanese male classical composers
Japanese male classical pianists
Japanese male conductors (music)
Japanese male film score composers
Japanese music arrangers
Japanese nationalists
Japanese television composers
Male television composers
Musicians from Tokyo
Nanjing Massacre deniers
Persons of Cultural Merit
Recipients of the Order of the Rising Sun, 4th class
University of Tokyo alumni
Video game composers