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Explores how Koji Kondo´s Super Mario Bros. (1985) score redefined video game music.

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Koji Kondo´s Super Mario Bros. (1985) score redefined video game music. With under three minutes of music, Kondo put to rest an era of bleeps and bloops-the sterile products of a lab environment-replacing it with one in which game sounds constituted a legitimate form of artistic expression. Andrew Schartmann takes us through the various external factors (e.g., the video game crash of 1983, Nintendo´s marketing tactics) that coalesced into a ripe environment in which Kondo´s musical experiments could thrive. He then delves into the music itself, searching for reasons why our hearts still dance to the "primitive" 8-bit tunes of a bygone era.

What musical features are responsible for Kondo´s distinct "Mario sound"? How do the different themes underscore the vastness of Princess Peach´s Mushroom Kingdom? And in what ways do the game´s sound effects resonate with our physical experience of the world? These and other questions are explored within, through the lens of Kondo´s compositional philosophy-one that would influence an entire generation of video game composers. As Kondo himself stated, "we [at Nintendo] were trying to do something that had never been done before." In this book, Schartmann shows his readers how Kondo and his team not just succeeded, but heralded in a new era of video games.

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Forward
Preface
Acknowledgements
INTRODUCTION
CONTEXTS
1-1 An Unlikely Hero is Born
1-2 Mario Grows Up
1-3 Kondo´s Compositional Philosophy
1-4 Kondo´s Instruments
MUSIC
2-1 Overworlds and Underworlds
2-2 The "Underwater" Waltz
2-3 Bowser´s "Castle" Theme & Other Endings
2-4 Sound Effects
CONCLUSION
Bibliography
Index

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Schartmann is convincing on Kondo´s genius ... It´s hard not to appreciate his high aim. If anyone still doubts a video game can be art, perhaps their definition of art is at fault. The Wire 20150819

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