How Classical Music Has Become Big Video Game Business

In case you are unaware, video games and video game music have come a long way from the 8-bit MIDI sound effects of Donkey Kong.  It’s a musical realm that has produced its own roster of superstar composers beginning in the 1980s with synthesizer “techno” scores created for games like The Revenge of Shinobi and Streets of Rage by Yuzo Koshiro; Koji Kondo’s accompaniment for Super Mario Brothers; and Nobuo Uematsu’s influential scores for the highly successful Final Fantasy series. To the point that Uematsu has gained the title of “the Beethoven of video games music.” – San Francisco Classical Voice