As part of Variety’s “Behind the Song,” “Shōgun” composer Leopold Ross broke down the show’s dramatic main title theme. What started as a simple email from a friend he’d worked with together in the past, asking Ross if he wanted help work on the score for “Shōgun,” turned into a nearly two-year-long collaboration with composer Nick Chuba, brother and composer Atticus Ross and arranger/composer Taro Ishida. A historical drama series set in the early 1600s, based on James Clavell’s novel of the same name, the series follows the journey of John Blackthorne, an English navigator who becomes shipwrecked in Japan and finds himself embroiled in the complex political and cultural landscape of the country.
As he navigates this foreign world, Blackthorne becomes entangled in the power struggles between feudal lords, particularly the ambitious daimyo, Lord Toranaga. The cast includes Hiroyuki Sanada as Lord Toranaga, Cosmo Jarvis as John Blackthorne, and Anna Sawai as Lady Mariko. One of the earliest ideas for the theme included Chuba playing the nose flute, as Justin Marks (co-creator and showrunner) felt that particular instrument was evocative of the world.
Once that central tenet had been introduced, the next step was to build it from there. “It became a case of building from here and turning this into a theme that encapsulated the world of ‘Shōgun’ and matched the kind of epic scale of the visuals,” Ross said. After introducing the nose flute, Ross.