Biography
Shoji Yamashiro is the pseudonym of Tsutomu Ōhashi, a Japanese composer and agricultural scientist. Born on 14 March 1933 in Oyama, Tochigi Prefecture, he graduated from Tohoku University with a doctorate in agriculture and later held academic posts including instructor at Tsukuba University and professor at the Chiba Institute of Technology.
In 1974 he founded the experimental music collective Geinoh Yamashirogumi, whose members include professionals from non-musical fields. He composed and conducted the score for the 1988 animated film Akira, fusing gamelan, Noh and Buddhist chant traditions with electronic synthesis; the music was recorded before animation began and served as the film's structural framework. He is also credited on the 2017 short I Am God.
