When people ask me “So, what kind of music do you listen to?” not only is that my least favorite question, it just has the most impossible answer. My natural inclination is to say ” Well, these are my favorite bands – but I primarily like music from video games.” Yeah. Doesn’t go over so smoothly. People just become instantly confused and when I try to explain how expansive video game music is, or how it’s “real music” – since a lot of people seem to think it “doesn’t count” this discussion usually ends up with me leaving people mind-freaked and my just telling them I listen to “indie” music to make it easier on them.
Probably since I was at least 11 or 12 I have been really into Japanese composer Nobuo Uematsu. I have followed everything he has done since. He composes a lot of music for one of my favorite video game series, Final Fantasy. Each game has a piano collection that’s eventually released. It’s all piano versions of the songs in game. It’s beautiful. I have every collection, and even as a kid I would sit in my room and draw and listen to these CD’s on repeat all night. That hasn’t changed, really. Here are a collection of my favorite piano collections, from my favorite video game collection.
FFIX – “Loss of Me”
FFVIII – “Succession of Witches”
FFVII – “Gold Saucer”
FFX – “Suteki Da Ne”
Tags: composer, final fantasy, final fantasy 10, final fantasy 7, final fantasy 8, final fantasy 9, final fantasy piano collections, nobuo uematsu, video game music
June 7, 2011 at 11:35 pm |
Have you heard of The Advantage? They cover NES music!
June 9, 2011 at 9:50 pm |
Oh my goodness – I havent but im literally looking them up RIGHT NOW. SO EXCITED. Thank you!!!
June 9, 2011 at 11:47 pm |
YAY!
When I added them to my Pandora, it kicked in some other bands that also cover video game music… awesome stuff!
Enjoy
April 3, 2012 at 2:58 am |
Haha, I know how it feels when people ask what kind of music do I listen to…if I know they’re a gamer, I’ll tell them about all the great soundtracks I’m into, but ya, if they’re not a gamer they just give blank stares…people must be really confused by my last.fm profile cuz it’s filled with Japanese game composers. I try to just tell them it helps me fall asleep
Man I remember back in the day when actual first pressing copies of the FF Piano collections (the ones that came with sheet music) were so rare. You were the shit at soundtrackcentral if you had one of those. I think I had to settle for a HK bootlegg for years until they finally reprinted the who series for IV-VI.
April 3, 2012 at 7:16 am |
I know the feeling when people ask you what music you’re into…if I know they’re gamers I’ll gush about all my favorite soundtracks, but everyone else would just give me blank stares. It’s even more confusing for them when they get a look at my last.fm profile full of Japanese game soundtrack composers!
Piano collections are really great. I remember back in the day the original pressings that included the sheet music were almost impossible to find without having to shell out hundreds of dollars…I remember having to make due with an HK pirate copy (a very well made one I might add) until they finally reprinted IV-VI…you were the soundtrack shit if you had one of those original copies.