It's appropriate that one factor behind the revelation that composer Mamoru Samuragochi did not write his most famous works is related to the Sochi Olympics. Samuragochi's ghostwriter, Takashi Niigaki, decided to end the deception when he realized that figure skater Daisuke Takahashi would be using Samuragochi's "Sonatina for Violin," which Niigaki had in fact written, for his short program.
"If I don't say anything," Niigaki said during a recent press conference, "Samuragochi will gain even more kudos for being a 'deaf genius.' "
Olympic coverage is more compelling when there is a story connected to it — the athlete who overcame hardship, the kid whose coach-parent died before the games. Samuragochi's fame was fed by a similar narrative: Son of Hiroshima A-bomb victims, self-taught as a musician-composer, struck by deafness in adulthood just as his career was coming into focus.
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