Masaru Satō
Masaru Satō (佐藤 勝) was a Japanese composer of film scores. The youngest of six brothers, all of them music lovers, Masaru Sato decided early in life that he wanted to be a composer. His models were two other composers born, as he was, on the northernmost Japanese island of Hokkaido: Akira Ifukube and Fumio Hayasaka. After hearing Hayasaka's score for Rashomon (1950), Sato decided Hayasaka was the only one he wanted for his teacher. He absorbed much of Hayasaka's modernist leanings, and grew to know Hayasaka's best friend Akira Kurosawa during this period. The year 1955 was a vast turning point for Sato: after scoring numerous insignificant pictures for various studios in Tokyo, Sato won the assignment for Gojira no Gyakushu (1955). Then his teacher Fumio Hayasaka died tragically young, while finishing the score for Kurosawa's Ikimono no Kiroku (1955). Sato stepped in to complete the score, uncredited. Kurosawa was sufficiently pleased with Sato to use him for all his pictures for the following ten years. Though the two had a falling-out after Akahige (1965), Sato remained one of Japan's most in-demand film composers, returning to the Gojira series several times and remaining a favorite of many other directors such as Kihachi Okamoto and June Fukuda. After scoring Dun-Huang in 1987, Sato had to call a brief halt to his career in order to tend to family interests in real estate in his native Hokkaido; but within a few years, the problems were wrapped up, and Sato was able to go back to film composing full time, at last reaching and surpassing his 300th movie score. Sato is almost unique among Japan's prolific film composers in that he has written extensively for his chosen field, but has never written for the concert stage.
Known for
The Goblin of Mt. Kurama
After the Rain
A Story of Modern Chivalry
Mitabi no kaikyô
East Meets West
Himeyuri no To
Gokenin Zankuro
In Blazing Love
Free and Easy Special
Bloom in the Moonlight “The Story of Rentaro Taki”
Korekara: Umibe no Tabibitotachi
The Oil-Hell Murder
Free and Easy 4
War and Youth
Heat Wave
Rainbow Kids
13 Assassins
She-Shogun
Fancy Dance
Dream Street
The Demon Comes in Spring
Shogun's Shadow
The Silk Road
The Great Department Store Robbery
The Forest of the Little Bear
Guys Who Never Learn
Tokyo Bordello
Taikoki
Yakuza Ladies
Kāsan no ki
Death Shadows
Tracked
Oar
Fireflies in the North
Adrift at Sea
Secret of the Forbidden Valley
The Geisha
Our Teacher
Lowly Ronin 6: Betrayal at Yatate Pass
Lowly Ronin 5: The Teenage Orphan Girl
Lowly Ronin 4: Living Hell
Irezumi
The Highest Honour
The Lowly Ronin 3: Duel at Dawn
Ah! Nomugi toge - Shinryokuhen
Xiongmao Monogatari TaoTao
At This Late Date, the Charleston
Willful Murder
Lowly Ronin
Toward the Terra
A Distant Cry from Spring
The Shogun Assassins
Nomugi Pass
Hunter in the Dark
Blood Type: Blue
Dynamite Don-Don
August without Emperor
The Glacier Fox
Sweet Revenge
The Yellow Handkerchief
The Love and Adventures of Kuroki Taro
Kyojin-gun monogatari: Susume eikô e
The Alaska Story
A Portrait of Shunkin
The Corporation
Tsuma to onna no aida
Solar Eclipse
Without Complaint
Aoba shigereru
Lupin the Third: Strange Psychokinetic Strategy
Machi no Hi
Violent Streets
Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla
Demon Spies
The Family
Submersion of Japan
Stray Dog
Men and War III: The Final Chapter
Long Journey into Love
Deeper Than Blue
The Twilight Years
Home from the Sea
Special Boy Soldiers of the Navy
Sapporo Winter Olympics
Onna no hanamichi
The Wolves
Song of the Horse
The Battle of Okinawa
Men and War II: Land of Love and Sorrow
幻の殺意
Banner of the Young
Where Spring Comes Late
Men and War I: Prelude to Destiny
City of Beasts
Incident at Blood Pass
The Scandalous Adventures of Buraikan
Shinsengumi: Assassins of Honor
The Great Japanese Pick-Pocket Club
Travels of Lord Mito
Red Lion
The Magoichi Saga
Tenchu!
Battle of the Japan Sea
Admiral Borneo: Betting at the Equator
Forward, Young People!
Goyokin
Futari no Koibito
Vagabond Schemer
Samurai Banners
Young People
Scrap Collectors
Hishakaku and Kiratsune: A Tale of Two Yakuza
The Human Bullet
My Brother, My Love
Admiral Yamamoto
Kill!
Judge and Jeopardy
Golden Eyes
Son of Godzilla
Sodachi zakari
Japan's Longest Day
Organized Violence II
Organized Violence
The Age of Assassins
Three Faces of Love
Three Sisters
Ebirah, Horror of the Deep
Koto—The Lake of Tears
The Mad Atlantic
Moment of Terror
Thirst for Love
The Sword of Doom
Cash Calls Hell
Ironfinger
Stairs of Evil
Rokujō yukiyama tsumugi
Fort Graveyard
Sanshiro Sugata
Three Yakuza
Cold Rice, Osan, Chan
Red Beard
The Tattooed Lord
Samurai Assassin
Juvenile Delinquents
Raised in a Palace
Samurai from Nowhere
The Desperate
Life of Hishakaku 3
Jakoman and Tetsu
Zoku ôsho
The Elegant Life of Mr. Everyman
Okashina yatsu
Samurai Pirate
Tale of Army Brutality
Life of Hishakaku 2
Legacy of the 500,000
Warring Clans
Life of Hishakaku
High and Low
Modern Children
Gekkyū dorobō
Operation Enemy Fort
Our Failures
零戦黒雲一家
The Ambitious Youth
Operation Sewer Rats
あの空の果てに星はまたたく
Burūtaun aoi machi no ōkami
Facing to the Clouds
The Crimson Sky
Otoko no Uta
Sanjuro
Run, Genta, Run!
Procurer of Hell
Blood on the Sea
Lord Mito: Struggle of Suke and Kaku
Challenge to Live
Yojimbo
Blueprint of Murder
Chikûho no kodomotachi
Westward Desperado
Sixteen years old
The Bad Sleep Well
Man Against Man
Girls Behind Bars
The Gambling Samurai
Intimidation
The Last Gunfight
The Age of Our Own
Desperado Outpost
Someday I'll Know
Gigantis, the Fire Monster
A Man Explodes
I Want to Be a Shellfish
I Will Challenge
The Praying Man
The Stream of Youth
Crimson Wings
The Man Who Wagers Tomorrow
Oban kanketsu hen
The H-Man
A Slope in the Sun
Rusty Knife
Akutoku
Song for a Bride
Zokuzoku Ôban: Dotô hen
I Am Waiting
The Lower Depths
The Living Koheiji
Zoku Ôban: Fûun hen
Last Days of the Samurai
Ôban
Streetlights
Throne of Blood
Crazed Fruit
Season of the Sun
The Vampire Moth
Crossroad
Nigetekita hanayome
Cell No. 8
I Live in Fear
Taira Clan Saga
Half Human
Six Assassins
Godzilla Raids Again
Ootone no Taiketsu