Kouhei Tanaka

田中公平

Kouhei attended Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music (Music Faculty, Composition Department), studying under Tomojirou Ikenouchi and other professors. He worked for three consecutive years at Victor Music Industries after he graduated from the University. He attended Berklee College of Music for two years after he left Victor Music Industries. After returning to Japan, Kouhei started his activities as a composer.

Though Kouhei had been playing at the hotel at first, he was requested to compose an insert song for "Arcadia of My Youth: Endless Orbit SSX", a 1982 TV anime, and it became his first work as a composer. Afterwards, he handled some more compositions of insert songs, this time for the Super Sentai series and he also did the composition of the background music for a TV anime, Konpora Kid, in 1985.

Notably, the score for Top wo Nerae! Gunbuster made his name and talent very famous among anime fans, and is recognized as one of his most important works. He also handled the composition of Top wo Nerae 2! Diebuster and showed a peculiar arrangement, which he added to his previous 17-year-old work. Another of his most important work is often said to be Yuusha-Ou GaoGaiGar, and the sequel following it.

In 2002, he won the first Tokyo Anime Award for Best Music for his work on Overman King Gainer.