B i o g r a p h y
Marika Takeuchi is a Japanese composer and pianist currently based in Los Angeles. She has released recordings of her modern classical music, as well as writing music for films, commercials, music libraries, and video games.
She began her studies in classical piano at the age of three in Japan. In addition to piano, she played violin and french horn for several years. She began studying composition and building a career as a composer at the age of 18, and her early career included composing for NHK radio and Universal Music Japan.
She moved to the U.S. in 2009 and studied film scoring at Berklee College of Music. She released her first album Night Dream, and the single The Arctic Light in 2011. The single has been featured in an Australian TV commercial, the Norwegian Tourism Board’s official website, and several other advertisements and short films.
Her 2nd album Impressions was nominated for Best Neo-Classical Album at the 10th annual ZMR Awards, and her 2016 album Colors in the Diary was produced by Grammy-winning producer Will Ackerman. She scored the award-winning short drama More Than One in 2016.
In July 2018, she released her 5th album Melding through a London-based indie label Bigo & Twigetti, and performed at their label concert in London. She was commissioned to write a piano solo piece Bloom for Sony Masterworks pianist Lara Downes's album Holes in the Sky, in March 2019. Her latest EP Missing Piece was released in 2020, and she scored a Canon USA commercial and an award-winning Italian short film The Vanishing Hitchhikers in the same year.
She has also written music for numerous music libraries, including West One Music, Extreme Music, APM Music, and participated in many piano compilation albums over the years. She released a piano solo album Lost Letters on West One Music Group, and her latest ambient album Dreamer in the Dark was released in September 2022. She also scored a PlayStation game Aurora’s Journey and the Pitiful Lackey, which was released on January 2023.