Bang on a Can All-Stars: RYUICHI SAKAMOTO, 1996 at Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts

Bang on a Can All-Stars perform a live tribute to Ryuichi Sakamoto's 1996 album, featuring new live arrangements by the ensemble's clarinetist-composer Ken Thomson. The program includes music from films such as The Last Emperor, Wuthering Heights, The Sheltering Sky, and Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence. The six-member ensemble — Lizzie Burns, Vicky Chow, David Cossin, Arlen Hlusko, Taylor Levine, and Ken Thomson — recreates the album for live performance, much of it for the first time. The concert honors Sakamoto (1952–2023), whose career spanned synthpop, film scoring, and experimental music across nearly 70 years.