Who composed the music for Escaflowne?

The music is by Yoko Kanno, co-composed with her then-husband Hajime Mizoguchi, with whom she had previously worked on Please Save My Earth. Scoring was not straightforward: the plot was still being rebuilt around Akane's new concept while they wrote, but the finished score, moving between contemporary writing, classical orchestra, and Gregorian chant, is what reviewers reached for first. Animerica's Egan Loo praised "some of the most dramatic music in any soundtrack, anime, or live-action."

The production also launched a career. Sixteen-year-old Maaya Sakamoto was cast as Hitomi and given the opening theme, "Yakusoku wa Iranai" ("No Need for Promises"). Kanno called her an ideal interpreter of her work; the two collaborated for decades afterward, and Escaflowne is generally treated as Sakamoto's starting line.