The revered New Zealand composer has passed away aged 70.

Composer Jack Body has passed away on Sunday May 10 aged 70, after battling terminal throat cancer for more than a year. The New Zealander died at Mary Potter Hospice in Wellington just a week after receiving an Arts Foundation of New Zealand Icon Award. Only 20 living artists of exceptional reputation at any one time are given the prestigious award, and other notable recipients include Sir Peter Jackson and photographer Ans Westra. He had previously been made an Arts Foundation Laureate and he is the first laureate to also receive an Icon Award.

Body had a prolific career as a composer, musicologist, educator, photographer and installationist. His works have been performed by a number of high-profile international ensembles including Lontano, the Kronos Quartet, ARC, the New Zealand String Quartet, the BBC Symphony Orchestra and the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra. His most widely known composition was the theme from the popular 1970s New Zealand soap opera, Close to Home.

Body was a highly influential music educator in his native New Zealand as well as in Indonesia and Asia. During 1976-77 he was a guest lecturer at the Akademi Musik in...