Reflections: All you have to do is ask

Video Game Music is something criminally underrated. In particular, I began with the music of my childhood. Growing up, me and my brothers had a Super Nintendo and a Nintendo 64. The soundtracks to Mega Man X 1-3, Donkey Kong Country and Donkey Kong Contry 2, Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars, Super Castlevania IV, F-Zero X, Super Smash Bros, and other titles had a huge influence on me. I thought, why can't this be music I regularly listen to just like what's on the radio? It wasn't until much later that I found out that video game music, especially in Japan, actually was printed on CDs and often celebrated. Thanks to the internet, I was able to explore a much bigger world of video game Soundtracks as I dove into other consoles.

In this world there was a lot of creative music. From the bizarre Alien Soldier, unique Vib-Ribbon, mystical Rudra Ni Hihou, I found music I could relate to and enjoy that reminded me of my childhood games. Soon I began my own video game music collection.

Falcom I completely found by accident. At Snesmusic.org, I was listening to as many SPC sets as I could, and I came across the Super Famicom versions of Brandish 2, Popful Mail, Ys IV: Mask of the Sun, and Ys III: Wanderers of Ys. I had never heard anything like this, and after looking into it more, I came across the original titles on the PC-88, PC-98, and NEC PC-Engine and that these were all developed by the same company: Falcom. Soon enough I found my favorite composers who were in Falcom Sound Team JDK: Mieko Ishikawa, Atsushi Shirakawa, Naoki Kaneda, Masaru Nakajima, Takahiro Tsunashima, Hirofumi Matsuoka, and Satoshi Arai.

In the video game music community, one of the parts we focus on are composition credits. Thanks to asking composers directly, game data, and credits from soundtracks, we have been able to discover a lot, but a lot of mysteries remain. In particular, the soundtracks Falcom released from the late 80s to early 2000s. This was my interest at least. On VGMdb, I discovered other Falcom fans who had went ahead and actually found credits to some games, and the two that I saw were Ys IV: Dawn of Ys, and Vantage Master JP. It was a tease for me because I had been wondering who composed what and we finally had something. Of course, it was not enough and soon after seeing this I decided to try and research to find out more.

These posts on VGMdb also revealed that some of the composers from that time in Falcom were active on Twitter. This provided a huge opportunity to find out more. Hirofumi Matsuoka was the first I was going to focus on, but due to other elements taking much too long he passed away from stomach cancer before I could find out anything. Luckily, Atsushi Shirakawa (TENMON), and Naoki Kaneda (KIM's Soundroom) were still there. I spent the following months collaborating with them and trying to figure out as many credits as I could from their memories. Many mysteries were solved, and somehow this resulted in me getting blocked from Falcom on Twitter.

After a few months, we had quite a bit of new information, and other people were asking as well. but there was still a lot more to ask. Thanks to the determination of other members in the Falcom community such as Preta, we acquired an even bigger set of credits that cleared up a lot we were wondering about. It even got as far as getting Masaru Nakajima involved in trying to remember who did what. Despite the occasional contradiction in a few credits due to memory, we almost completely solved the mystery of Falcom's composer credits. There is still more to do now, but at least now we're almost done (with this era of composers at least).

During and After Falcom: Mieko Ishikawa

Mieko Ishikawa is one of Falcom's earliest composers, and now, a director for the company. She began composing in the late 80's, and retired in 1994 after The Legend of Heroes III: White Witch. The first two tracks I want to explore are from Sorcerian:

This captures her style perfectly. Next we can look at a battle track:

Another of Ishikawa's very impressive feats was being the sole composer of Ys III: Wanderers of Ys. The epic welcoming theme:

Here is another standout track:

And this probably the most famous of the soundtrack:

Moving on she composed in Dinosaur alongside Masaaki Kawai. It had a much darker and somewhat twisted tone compared to Ys III. This is from the FM Towns Version:

Afterwards, we move towards the more lighthearted Popful Mail. Atsushi Shirakawa gave me all his composer credits, which resulted in the remaining coming down to Ishikawa. First is the opening: Distant Valhalla:

Menu:

The next two are arranged versions from the Sega CD version. These are most likely arranged by Hirofumi Matsuoka:

And the last song is from the Super Famicom version, possibly also arranged by Hirofumi Matsuoka:

Afterwards, we continue with The Legend of Heroes II. On Twitter, a usernamed "The Spoony Bard" had asked Atsushi Shirakawa what he had composed. As a result, the remainder of the tracks fall under Ishikawa. We assume that Kawai is gone by now and the soundtrack was only between Shirakawa and Ishikawa. Here's a track by Ishikawa:

And my personal favorite from the game:

After this. 4 new members would join in 1992. They are Naoki Kaneda, Hirofumi Matsuoka, Masaru Nakajima, and Takahiro Tsunashima. They would take on the role of composing and succeed Mieko Ishikawa. Ishikawa would contribute a small number of tracks for The Legend of Xanadu and The Legend of Heroes III, but she would completely disappear from composing and instead focus on her role as one of the directors for the company which she still does to this day.

Why did Falcom block me on Twitter?

I've never contacted them. This is odd.

Resources for Older Falcom Music.

This blog deserves a mention as a good source for older Falcom music.

raborak.com/saladedemais/

One thing I want to mention is that the version of Brandish VT's soundtrack that is uploaded there is of very bad quality. A superior version can be heard at another great Falcom source: The Falcom Music Channel.

Ys IV Interview 1993

This is taken from an interview about the development process of Ys IV: featured are Mieko Ishikawa, Naoki Kaneda, Atsushi Shirakawa, and Takahiro Tsunashima. Credit to shmuplations for the translations:

Composing Ys IV

with the Falcom Sound Team J.D.K
(Mieko Ishikawa, Atsushi Shirakawa,
Takahiro Tsunashima, Naoki Kaneda)

—I still haven’t played Xanadu or Ys IV yet, but I have been able to listen to the music for Ys IV. My first thought: unmistakably Falcom. (laughs) It was like, this could only be the music for the next Ys game.

Ishikawa: Thank you. Can I take that as a compliment?

—Of course!

Ishikawa: The big premise for Ys IV was that it was a direct sequel to Ys, so naturally the music had to have all the classic hooks from those songs… you could call it destiny. (laughs) Living up to that was a ton of pressure on us, the sound staff, so to hear those words from you makes me so happy, and is a huge relief.

—So it was very stressful, composing the Ys IV music?

Ishikawa: As a composer, having the color and tone of the music decided beforehand makes things easier in one sense, but if you aren’t able to break away from that, then you worry that listeners will feel like everything sounds the same.

“First Step Towards Wars”, an example
of the “zundara” galloping rhythm.

—I see. By the way, what do you all of you feel the “Ys sound” is?

Tsunashima: The zundara beat! ²

—Eh? zu, zundara beat?

Shirakawa: Yeah, it’s the galloping basslines. zu!-ta-ka, zu!-ta-ka…

—Ah, ahhhh. I get it now. Yeah, Ys music really does have a lot of that rhythm pattern, now that you mention it.

Kaneda: A classical melody on top of a zundara rhythm… that’s pretty much Ys right there. To me at least.

—Right, right. You know, Michio Fujiwara, who is a friend of the Falcom label, often says the music of Ys has a lot in common with classical music. I would say it’s not just Ys, but all of Falcom’s melodies have a unique quality. Sometimes the melancholy is so sweet and pointed, I’ve even shed tears… Tomohiko Kishimotowas saying that his roots were heavy metal, and I can feel that in the mood of Falcom’s music.

Kaneda: That’s because we base our music on heavy metal and classical.

—Ahh, does that mean you’re a metalhead?

Kaneda: Hah, maybe I am. Right now I’m obsessed with Deep Purple. Uh oh–looks like I’ve just outed myself! I’ve been into other stuff lately too though, like African music.

—That explains your short hair then. And for the rest of you, what music have you been into recently?

Tsunashima: I really love karaoke. I’m always listening to ZARD, B’z, WANDS… and I’m an excellent singer! My dream is to have my voice in a game. It’s what I really, ♬ re~a~la~la~lyyy wa-a-nttt! ♬

—Is he into being-kei? ³

Ishikawa: Yeah (chuckles). And Shirakawa is a Vangelis otaku.

Shirakawa: Vangelis is like a teacher to me: for music, for life, for everything. Lately I’ve been into progressive rock, and irregular time signatures…

Ys IV OST.

—What progressive groups do you like?

Shirakawa: I love Yes.

Ishikawa: That’s it! Now I get it!

—Huh? Wh, what do you get now Ishikawa?

Ishikawa: I knew it wasn’t my imagination! You’ve been off-time a lot lately, just behind the beat! You bastard, you’ve become one of those offtime proglovers! We’ll just have to “beat” that out of you.. a strict march should do it!

Shirakawa: He–hey, wha–OW!

Ishikawa: Take that! Hut-two-three-four, hut-two-three-four!

Shirakawa: Ugh… ah! ah.. mm, aa… that feels good…

—Um…

Tsunashima: ♬ hey every~body~, let’s stop the vi~o~lenceee, sing with me now! ~oo that scent of your, faded jeanssss~ ♬

—Calm down, please everyone, calm down!

Ishikawa: The duple meter is the basis of all human life! Tempo 120! Yes sir! hut-two, hut-two, hut-two….

—Uh, n-no thank you, I’m good!

Kaneda: HAHAHAHAH.

End.

Interview with Atsushi Shirakawa (Tenmon)

A few years ago I got the idea to interview Atsushi Shirakawa (Tenmon). I reached out to him, and with the help of a few people, I got the chance to ask him questions. This resulted in the following interview. A little known fact is that I also wanted to interview the late Hirofumi Matsuoka, but he unfortunately passed away before I got the chance to. Here is the interview:

vgmonline.net/tenmoninterview/

Who are the People in the Brandish 3 Pictures?

The only pictures we had of the Falcom sound team of the 90's are with are inside the Brandish 3: Spirit of Balcan booklet. For years we didn't know who was in the picture, but now we know thanks to KIM (Naoki Kaneda). He told me:

Left to Right: Satoshi Arai, Naoki Kaneda, Atsushi Shirakawa, Kishimoto, Endo, and (maybe) the Mixing Engineer.

 Here are the rest of the photos.