Joe Hisaishi

Born in 1950 in Nagano, Japan, Joe Hisaishi—whose given name is Mamoru Fujisawa—emerged in the late 1970s as a composer and pianist at the intersection of contemporary music and popular formats. Trained in composition at Tokyo’s Kunitachi College of Music, he began with works influenced by minimalism and electronic music before turning to music for the screen, initially for animation and television. Hisaishi’s collaboration with Hayao Miyazaki started with the 1984 score for Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind and continued with My Neighbor Totoro, Princess Mononoke, and Spirited Away, where he developed a style combining transparent symphonic orchestration, simple melodic themes, repetitive motifs, and prominent piano writing. In parallel, Hisaishi composed for Takeshi Kitano’s films—particularly in the 1990s—moving between lyrical scores, more stripped-back atmospheres, and harmonic colors akin to chamber music. His discography includes personal albums such as Information (1982), My Lost City (1989), and several volumes of Piano Stories, in which he rearranges his themes for piano and small ensembles. Also active as a conductor, Hisaishi regularly leads his own symphonic suites and writes standalone concert works, balancing neo-Romantic writing, a minimalist legacy, and occasional references to Japanese music.