Back in the dark days of 2001, just a few short days after the World Trade Centre attack, Time Magazine published a touching story about a Japanese composer who had lost his hearing just at the time he was beginning to be recognized. Momoru Samuragochi was born in Hiroshima in 1963 to parents who where both hibakusha or atomic bomb survivors. Hibakusha and their children have suffered terrible discrimination in Japan and there is little doubt that Samuragochi would have also suffered because of this. Among other things, he had no classical music training at all despite being a prodigious talent from an early age and possessing 'perfect pitch' - the ability to determine a note without reference.
The Time article recounted Samuragochi’s childhood and his slow climb to prominence, beginning with an acclaimed soundtrack for the TV movie “Cosmos”, followed by more works for television, film and video games. At the time of the article, he had broken new ground by convincing Sony to engage a 200 piece orchestra to record the soundtrack for a new video game for the PS2. All while completely deaf in one ear and with only the faintest hearing, aided by a hearing aid, from the other ear.
The article included touching anecdotes of Samuragochi acknowledging that while he would never hear his music played by an orchestra, he could “see” the music in his head and that perhaps his deafness was actually a blessing of sorts. It ended though with the tragic scene of Samuragochi trying to hide his slight weeping as he strained to hear the beat of taiko drums in a piece of music he had composed. The percussive instruments being the only ones that he could detect.
The Time article added a great deal to Samuragochi’s celebrity status, diminished somewhat by the enormous news of the 911 terror attacks, but exposing him to a whole new audience in the western world. His status was considerable in Japan already, but now began to grow in the rest of the world. He cut an impressive figure in conservative Japan, bulky, long-haired and constantly wearing sunglasses as they slightly diminished his tinnitus. It seemed that Samuragochi, a musical genius with a flair for public appearances and a slightly eccentric personality, was destined to stardom despite his disabilities.
Not long after the Time piece appeared, Samuragochi completed work on "Hiroshima Symphony No 1", a work dedicated to the survivors of the bombing of Hiroshima. It would be another 3 years before he finally released the symphony and its release would coincide with the release of his autobiography, also titled “Symphony Number 1”. The Hiroshima Symphony became a major hit within the world of classical music, selling almost 200,000 copies; not much for a pop diva, but significant for a classical composer. The work was even more poignant given the composer’s deafness, his status as a hibakusha and the startling difficulties he endured throughout its composition as recounted in his autobiography.
Some years later, after the Tohoku Earthquake and Tsunami, Samuragochi, now unable to walk without the aid of a cane, toured the affected area and spoke with some of the survivors. Much of the tour was filmed and scenes of him greeting elderly residents were played with the Hiroshima Symphony accompanying it. It was heart-rending to watch as Samuragochi hobbled over debris to greet elderly residents, their words interpreted for him by sign-language, them slightly starstruck and him humble and sincere.
In early 2014, in yet another accolade for Samuragochi, Daisuke Takahashi announced that he would be using Samuragochi’s ‘Sonatina for Violin’ at the Sochi Winter Olympics in February. This was no small matter, Takahashi had won a bronze medal at the Vancouver Winter Olympics, the first Japanese man to medal in figure skating. He’d gone on to win silver the next year at the world championships and then gold at the world Gran Prix Final. The Winter Olympics sit prominently in the Japanese collective psyche and there was great hope that Takahashi would bring a gold medal for Japan and the news that it would be set to music composed by a Japanese - and a deaf one at that - was received warmly.
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On 5th February 2014, early in the morning, a small but prestigious Japanese law firm sent a nondescript press release in the usual fashion to about a dozen major Japanese press agencies. Plain black on white, with no fanfare and couched in the vague terms for which Japanese language is famed, the release appeared to imply that their client, Samuragochi, had relied on a ghostwriter for several of his compositions over a period of many years. I say “appeared to imply” because the language was so vague as to render a literal translation impossible. The release went on to suggest that while Samuragochi had ‘designed’ the works, he had engaged a ghostwriter to complete them.
The press, of course, went into a minor frenzy. Three questions filled their minds immediately; how long had it been happening? How many of his compositions involved a ghostwriter? And the biggest of all was; who is the mystery ghostwriter? Throughout the morning, hurried “Breaking” articles appeared on the television and various “experts” were brought in to discuss the situation in a learned manner. The experts were generally classical musicians of some sort who would either explain that it’s perfectly normal to enlist outside help to complete a major work or decry the very idea of using outside help to complete any work.
By the afternoon, the ghostwriter had been identified as Takashi Niigaki, a Tokyo based music teacher and part time composer who had acted as Samuragochi’s assistant at many events and the press were now eagerly seeking him out. He was tracked down fairly quickly and what was found was perhaps the most nerdy person in a country that prides itself on the dorkiness of its nerds.
Niigaki is a nervous-looking, small, thin man and even his friends describe him as a nerd - a music nerd, but a nerd nonetheless. He has never owned a computer, a television or even a mobile phone and he writes all his compositions by hand, something almost unheard of among modern composers. Easily pushed around, struggling to say no to any request, he presents as a conservative, slightly bumbling, constantly apologising persona that stands in stark contrast to Samuragochi’s long-haired, hyper-confident, larger-than-life presence. Niigaki agreed to front a press conference later that evening.
At the press conference, Niigaki spoke in the very polite and extremely vague terms that are the usual way for formal announcements made in Japanese. He had either known or worked with Samuragochi for about 18 years, He felt that he had written most of Samuragochi’s work in that time and he had pressured Samuragochi to reveal the truth when the news of the Winter Olympics had been released.
When asked about Samuragochi’s deafness, Niigaki stammered his way through an explanation that he was not ‘entirely convinced’ that Samuragochi’s deafness was as profound as it appeared to be to the public. A more literal translation of Niigaki’s comment would include a lot more qualification to the statement - “after long consideration” and “carefully considering the matter”, “it might be possible” - that sort of thing, but the thrust of the matter was that Samuragochi was not, in fact deaf after all.
Samuragochi’s law firm released a press statement soon after Niigaki’s press conference, subtly suggesting that his comments were driven by envy and pointing out the absurdity of his claim that Samuragochi is not deaf. After all, Samuragochi had government certification as being “severely disabled”[1] due to his hearing disability. How could that be fake? Samuragochi made veiled threats to sue Niigaki and added that Samuragochi's lip-reading of Niigaki would have improved over time to the point where conversation would have seemed almost normal to an observer and this may have lead to Niigaki’s mistaken belief.
Shortly afterward, it emerged that AERA magazine had planned a feature article on Samuragochi in June the previous year and sent a reporter along for the interview. The interviewer noticed that when the doorbell rang, Samuragochi turned toward it to see who it was. He also noticed that Samuragochi would often respond to questions before the sign-language interpreter had finished signing and that this became more pronounced as the interview wore on. The article implied very strongly that Samuragochi's hearing impediment was not as profound as might be thought. The article was rejected by AERA due to their doubts about its veracity as well as doubts about some statements made by Samuragochi himself.
The incident also highlighted a work from a few months earlier, written by the composer Takeo Noguchi and published in the modest Shincho 45 Magazine (新潮45) after having been rejected by every major music magazine in Japan. Noguchi alleged that several of Samuragochi’s works included adapted pieces from composers such as Mahler, Mozart and Bach. Not really plagiarism, but unexpected in a composer that allegedly had no classical training at all. Noguchi also alluded to Samuragochi as being an ‘unlikely’ composer of such music.
Over a period of several months, to the embarrassment of many, it became clear that Samuragochi's hearing was near-normal, his difficulty in walking was entirely confected, he did not have perfect pitch and could barely play an instrument, let alone compose a major work like a symphony.
It turned out that the whole thing had started many years before when Samuragochi had by sheer force of personality managed to get himself hired as the composer for a short film. After a fumbling attempt to put something together, he met with Niigaki, introduced by a mutual acquaintance, one afternoon in a coffee shop and suggested that he could hire Niigaki to “help” finalizing the work. Niigaki agreed eagerly - it’s rare enough to get paid for composing anything and common enough for a composer to engage another to assist with scoring the composition - but found that what had already been done by Samuragochi was all but unusable. In a rare moment of candour, Niigaki later said of Samuragochi’s work that it was “rudimentary”. That was about as close as he would ever come to criticising Samuragochi let alone insulting him.
Niigaki expected to be credited in the score, but was not and being easily pushed around, accepted Samuragochi’s explanation that it was “just not possible” in this case. More work followed and Niigaki, unable to say no, acquiesced on each occasion. As Samuragochi’s fame grew, his ‘deafness’ became more profound and he began to bring Niigaki with him as his “assistant” at preparations for concert performances of his work. Niigaki would explain some of the more difficult movements to the conductor after ‘consulting’ with Samuragochi and the charade continued on.
Niigaki composed the famed “Hiroshima Symphony Number 1” in its entirety over a period of a year and considered it his finest work. It was this that forced him to finally confront Samuragochi and demand that he disclose the circumstances of its composition or at the very least, acknowledge Niigaki’s contribution. Samuragochi refused and when Niigaki threatened to go public, Samuragochi broke down and tearfully told Niigaki that his life was no longer worthwhile and he would proceed to suicide along with his wife. Niigaki relented yet again.
There were two things that finally drove Niigaki to force the issue. The first was the announcement that the figure-skater, Takahashi, would be using his work for the olympics - Niigaki felt that this would bring Takahashi into disrepute should the truth ever come out. The second issue was one that tweaked at the little pride that Niigaki had, pride in his music. The article by Noguchi alleged plagiarism and Niigaki could not stand for this to go unchallenged and knew full well that Samuragochi would not be able to defend the work in discussion. This, perhaps more than anything stiffened his resolve.
It’s still doubtful, to me at least, that Niigaki would ever have gone public if Samuragochi’s lawyers had not issued their press release. Niigaki actually made no effort to go public, it was he that was approached by the press and it now seems that the law firm thought they could see off any scandal caused by getting in first. It also appeared that the lawyers believed that Samuragochi was indeed the composer of his own music and that they were as mislead as any member of the general public.
Over the course of 2014 Niigaki became a major Japanese celebrity, both in serious music discussion and also on Japanese variety and comedy shows. His shyness and reluctance to criticize meant that many of the more sordid tales had to be wheedled out of him and so it was midway through 2014 before it was realised that he had earned a total of about A$80,000 over a period of 18 years for the work he had done. Over the same period, Samuragochi had earned tens of millions of dollars.
I saw Niigaki on television a number of times myself and his shuffling, immensely shy presence, on comedy shows especially, was a source of many a belly-laugh. What was truly remarkable though was his genuine talent for music. On one show I saw, he was playing music on a piano to score a completely unscripted discussion. Niigaki’s contribution varied from apt to hysterically funny, playing gentle background music at times and lapsing into the ghostbusters theme or some other popular tune at others. There was no doubt that he was the star of the show. By the end of 2014, he had been named the Fuji Television Celebrity of the Year.
On yet another occasion he was interviewed by the Wall Street journal and the interview was recirded on video as well. Part way through the interview he was asked if he could write a music theme for the WSJ. He thought about it for a moment or two before sitting at his piano and playing an improvised piece that “sounds noble” to honour the newspaper.
Perhaps the most delicious of the many ironies in the story is the one that Niigaki eventually gave up many months after the story had broken and he had become sufficiently confident to explain some of the work he had done. The particular piece in the final section of the Hiroshima symphony that had drawn attention from Noguchi as being overly similar to Gustav Mahler had also been commented by other musical scholars who considered it anything from a graceful acknowledgement to Mahler to an outright rip-off of his work. It was this as much as anything that had prompted Niigaki to go public and eventually he was asked about this and the extent to which he had “borrowed” from Mahler.
Niigaki was red-faced when he explained that it was not Mahler at all, but rather a reference to the theme song of the 1974 anime hit “Space Battleship Yamato”. Niigaki had become weary of Samuragochi’s demands that the music be more “sombre” or more “serious” and included a reference to anime as a gentle mocking of Samuragochi, mockery that he would never dare face-to-face. Niigaki was confident that Samuragochi would never notice the reference even though Niigaki himself found it quite blatant. What he hadn’t realised was that no one else would notice it either.
Niigaki remains a popular figure in Japan and has established himself as a serious musician. Samuragochi has faded to obscurity and his name is only ever trotted out in Japan in reference to the scandal. It’s a fascinating story, but I can’t help but wonder about the nature of fame in the arts. Niigaki has always been this good, but now he is acclaimed. Is it really the case that he has suddenly become a musician of renown? He had released music in his own name in the past, but it was largely ignored. To what extent is talent recognised for its own sake and to what extent does it depend on the serendipity of circumstance? To what extent is fame a function in it’s own right and talent a secondary consideration, able to bolster fame but not able to obtain it?
So if Niigaki and Samuragochi have done nothing else, they have given me comfort that my own writing may well be brilliant after all. It’s just that I am not sufficiently famous.
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[1] The Japanese government issues a special booklet (身体障害者手帳 ) to those considered disabled, with disabilities categorized as mental, intellectual and physical and then ‘graded’ from 1 to 12. A grade 1 disability is the most severe and would generally involve a complete inability to care for oneself. Samuragochi was classified as grade 2.
Note: much of this essay was written by virtue of my very dodgy Japanese interpretations of Japanese language articles, with much help from Mr Google and his translation machine. I haven’t included as many inline references as a I usually would as many of them are Japanese and are unlikely to be helpful to most of my readers. Instead I present below a bibliography of sorts listing articles I consulted while drafting. I suspect that I have left some out, but these will get you on your way should you wish to do you own research.
http://www.j-cast.com/tv/2014/02/06196193.html?p=all
http://www.cyzo.com/2014/02/post_16153_entry.html
http://www.nikkansports.com/entertainment/news/p-et-tp0-20140210-1255583.html
http://www.asahi.com/articles/ASJ3C569VJ3CUEHF00M.html
https://nikkan-spa.jp/1292180
http://www.huffingtonpost.jp/2014/02/05/ghost-writer_n_4734967.html
http://www.tokyo-sports.co.jp/entame/entertainment/236379/
http://edition.cnn.com/2014/02/06/world/asia/japan-mamoru-samuragochi-beethoven/index.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+rss/cnn_latest+%28RSS:+Most+Recent%29
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-02-06/japans-beethovennot-even-deaf-ghost-composer/5244282
https://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/07/arts/music/renowned-japanese-composer-mamoru-samuragochi-admits-fraud.html?_r=0
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2014/02/05/national/noted-deaf-composer-admits-someone-else-writes-his-music/#.WKfEPhKGP-Z
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/classical/news/japanese-beethoven-mamoru-samuragochi-admits-faking-deafness-9123258.html
http://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-26039226
And finally, I especially commend the following article which I was annoyed to find only after I had completed a first draft of this essay;
https://newrepublic.com/article/121185/japans-deaf-composer-wasnt-what-he-seemed
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