Japanese composer Mari Takano (b. 1960).
Takano got her first piano lessons from her mother at the age of three and wrote her first composition at five. After completing composition studies under Mutsuo Shishido at the Toho Gakuen College of Music, she went on to study in Germany at the College of Music, Freiburg, under Brian Ferneyhough, and at the College of Music and Performing Arts, Hamburg, under Gyorgy Ligeti. She graduated in 1988. Since the 80's, Mari Takano has been awarded numerous prizes. Encouraged by Gyoergy Ligeti, she overcame Avantgarde influences and developed her own original style.
She teaches as assistant lecturer at the Toho Junior College of Music and at the Joshibi Highschool of Art and Design.