Laura Intravia: Performer, Composer, Arranger

Let's change things up a little! Instead of talking about one game in particular this week, let's talk about a musical concept and how it is applied in games from different series. This is a big post I had a lot of fun writing about, because it's a really neat concept that can be really powerful when used correctly: the counter-melody.

Wikipedia says the definition of counter-melody is “a sequence of notes, perceived as a melody, written to be simultaneously with a more prominent lead. Typically a counter-melody performs a subordinate role, and is heard in a texture consisting of a melody plus accompaniment.”

What does all of that mean? Basically, a counter-melody is exactly what it sounds like: it's a secondary melody that is meant to “counter” the primary melody. It generally follows a totally different rhythm and contour (shape) than the primary melody, so that it stands out in the texture. A lot of the classic game tunes feature a “melody & accompaniment” form, like in Zelda II's “Palace Theme.”

The middle line of music is obviously supporting the melody; it is not a melody in and of itself, but simply an accompanying pattern that lies underneath the melody. A counter-melody is different in that it would also have a melodic character of its own.  

The strength of using a counter-melody in video game music is that it adds variation to a repeated melody. Let's face it, most video game music HAS to be able to loop endlessly, right? A counter-melody is a great way to prevent the theme from getting old. A counter-melody can make the original melody sound way more interesting, by highlighting the differences between the two.

Before we look at Banjo-Tooie's “Atlantis,” one of this week's new transcriptions, let's bounce back to a piece I posted a while ago, “The Bunnies” from Super Mario Galaxy. This is a freaking PERFECT EXAMPLE of how counter-melody works, and in a really lovely, mystical way.

First, take a look at about half of the primary melody of The Bunnies.

Check out the bottom staff in the piano; obviously just accompaniment, right? We wouldn't describe that figure as being melodic in nature—the repeated pattern is actually closer to an ostinato.

Now let's jump ahead in the piece:

Check out that second line. It's not simply arpeggiating chords, it has a distinctive shape and character of its own, completely unrelated to the primary melody. The primary melody is much more rhythmically active, on a punctuated harp string sound; the secondary melody has a fuller, sustained sound and less rhythmic activity. Each melody tends to move in opposition to the other; i.e., when one goes up, the other goes down.

Now what does this mean musically? What does this convey to the listener? Here's my take on it, my own opinion: The primary melody kind of hops around innocently on that high harp sound, so for me, it represents the bunnies. The secondary melody sounds a bit softer to my ears, and is much more sustained and has a —for lack of a better word--”sci-fi” kind of synthy sound. This is just my own take, but it gives the piece a feeling of weightlessness for me (weightlessness...loss of gravity...HEY WAIT WE'RE IN SPACE). The sound design in and of itself suggests a feeling of wonderment to me, like a child exploring a new world. In the game, Mario has just woken up on a strange planet after being blown into space by Bowser; he wakes up and encounters space bunnies who encourage him to catch them. The purpose of this scene is to give the player more practice with Mario's game controls; so, not only does the music convey the dramatic content of the scene (“Where am I and who are these bunnies?”), it also reflects what is happening for the player him/herself: exploring the controls and the new space world you find yourself in. It's an innocent song, which conveys to the player that he/she can freely experiment with the controls without fear for Mario's life.

It's pretty cool how much a simple counter-melody can add, isn't it? Let's look at some more examples. First, “Atlantis” from Banjo-Tooie. Primary melody:

 Now let's jump ahead to where the counter-melody comes in.  

Oooooh, something neat is going on here! The melody is obviously in the high flute, and in the lower flute at m. ___ we have what sounds to me like a long, sustained counter-melody. Then, at m. 39, ANOTHER counter-melody splits off of the first one. It only lasts for a few measures until m. 9 of this example, where it takes over the primary melody-line.

Now the high flute has a supporting role, the low flute is the primary. It all happens in the span of just a few seconds and the result is seamless, each melody-line weaving in and out of the other (Like fish swimming in the ocean, OH SNAP!)

One more example! This is from a personal favorite tune of mine, “Forest Frenzy” from Donkey Kong Country. Take a listen to the entire song here, see if you can pick out the counter-melody just by listening. 

Hopefully you caught it on that first hearing! Now check it out in the sheet music:

Now, for me, the counter-melody does not stick out as strongly in this piece as in the other examples. This piece has a LOT of ostinati in it—those repeating rhythmic and chordal figures make up a lot of the catchiness of the song—but as a result of the repetitive nature of the texture, the counter-melody is kind of lost. It isn't as different from the melody as it could be. In fact, it's almost tempting to call it simply some sort of accompanimental figure—but the fact that it is a single-line melody (one note at a time) and it's in a higher register than the primary melody makes me think that this was intended to be a counter-melody. Not as prominent as the other examples we looked at...but maybe that was the point. This piece is highly rhythmic and the melody is not necessarily the most important feature. So the weaker counter-melody doesn't really take away from the piece, but helps the melody blend in with the rest of the texture.

That's a lot of information to digest, but hopefully you get the idea of all the different ways a counter-melody can function. To finish this ginormous post off, I want to quote a very famous poem by William Carlos William. “It is a principle of music / to repeat the theme. Repeat / and repeat again, / as the pace mounts.” This is more true than ever in video game music, a medium that requires musical looping for the player to have freedom to play at his/her own pace. It is how composers vary the theme, to make it different each time we hear it, that enables us as listeners to not become bored with the same thing over and over again. The video game world has a history steeped in extremely strong melodies—melodies so catchy that you can hear it literally a thousand times and not get bored—but as the hardware grew, so did the capabilities of the composers to create music with more variation. I mean, what was the average length of the typical video game song in the 80's, like one or two minutes? Now we have composers creating much longer pieces with more depth in the music that supports the melody; and that's how we get pieces with beautiful use of counter-melody like “The Bunnies,” “Atlantis” and countless other examples in video game music.  

Here are some more pieces of video game music with counter-melody...can you spot those moments just by listening? Can you find more examples in video game music that I haven't listed here? I'd love to hear them!

New Super Mario Bros. Wii - Staff Roll
Legend of Zelda: Windwaker - Staff Roll
Ar-tonelico - Singing Hill
Star Fox - Main Titles

Enjoy this week's transcriptions of Atlantis and Grunty Industries from Banjo-Tooie! More on the way! 

I recently finally got to sit down and play through the entirety of Super Mario Galaxy. I haven't really read any professional game reviews about it, but personally, I LOVED this game. Everything including the level design, the completely beautiful construction of the Comet Observatory as the galaxy map, the occasionally excruciating Prankster Comet challenges, Luigi's complete adorableness...and especially the music. I am addicted. It is now officially my dream to perform this music in an orchestra someday. I was surprised to learn that most of the music was not composed by Koji Kondo, but by composer Mahito Yokota. Not only are some of the tracks BEYOND EPIC (Melty Molten Galaxy, Gusty Garden, Bowser Battle), but there are also some throwbacks to old themes from earlier Mario games (Toy Time Galaxy, Nostalgia 1), as well as some really soft, moving tracks that reflected the sweet, sentimental aspects of the plot (Bunnies, Sad Story). I don't want to spoil the ending for anyone who hasn't beaten it yet, but this was a pretty deep Mario game; it had a lot of references to the circle of life, life after death, etc. And this from a franchise that started out as, in the words of my friend Mallory, “A plumber who jumps down pipes.” :-P Mario, you have a-certainly a-come a long way.

Which brings me to the point of this article! So, while I was getting some arranging work done for a few clients this week, I put on some Super Mario Galaxy tracks to listen to, which inspired me to randomly asked on Facebook, “What are everyone's favorite tracks from this game?” Most of the votes were for Gusty Garden, which I think turned out to be kind of the iconic Galaxy theme. And one of my friends, in addition to his vote, sent me the link to this completely awesome interview with the music and sound design team of Super Mario Galaxy. This is, by far, one of the coolest articles I've ever read on video game music. It interviews the composers and sound designer of the game and really digs into how they tried to make this game unique, but still retain the “Essence of Mario.” It's such a great, in-depth look at not only the music of Super Mario Galaxy, but the entire Mario series as a whole. I'm not going to paraphase the entire article here, you just need to stop and read it right now LOL—but I will say that I practically fell out of my chair when I read the section where Yokota talks about his original conception for the game. He mentions at one point that he had always thought Mario games had a lot of—I kid you not--Latin influences.

I couldn't believe it!! I mean, this blog is just a collection of my own ideas and takes on music in video games. I try not to be a “reviewer,” I don't want to judge a soundtrack as being “good” or “bad,” I just want to talk about the music itself, the different techniques composers use to construct their pieces, and what I personally hear when I listen to the music. So it was a really special moment for me to know that such a renowned, talented composer such as Mahito Yokota heard the same Latin influences in Mario music as I did—and that we were both kind of backwards in the way we were thinking! While Yokota and I both heard some pretty distinct Latinesque influences (sometimes as simple as just bongos and steel drums), Kondo states in the Iwata interview that he was never actually conscious of his Latin tendency. It was something that kind of popped out from time to time, but only when it suited the game.

Let's quickly return to my post from a few weeks ago: Why did Latin music suit Super Mario Kart so well? I think it had to do with the rhythmic qualities to Latin music. It gets your feet tapping, makes you feel like moving; basically, it excites you. And I think a racing game needs exciting music to make it work. I'm sure there are examples out there of racing or driving games with calmer music that disproves this theory, but if we're talking about Super Mario Kart, a game in which you are desperately trying to trip up your opponents with banana peels and blast them off the track with a well-timed lightning bolt. I think it calls for some pretty heart-pumping musical action. So Latin music worked perfectly for that game, and many of the following Mario Kart and Mario Party games.

But when Yokota wrote 28 tracks of Latin space music and Kondo rejected them, it was like a slap in the face. He was pretty upset. There are a plethora of Mario games in which samba rhythms and steel drums worked just fine, why wouldn't it work for Super Mario Galaxy? That's when Kondo showed Yokota the light: he had it backwards. Yokota was trying to copy the “Mario sound,” when really, he should have been writing music that suited the game. In truth, there is no exact formula for a Mario sound; Mario is made up of many sounds and styles and genres, Latin is just one of them. And to try to copy any of the preceding Mario games would be a mistake, because there is no Mario game like Super Mario Galaxy. It's not Mario in a go-kart, Mario in a doctor's coat or even Super Mario 64. This is freaking Super Mario Blasting Through Space, and therefore a full-fledged symphony orchestra and scary Bowser choir is in order. Once this fact was realized, Yokota and Kondo really came together and were able to create such an amazing, epic, orchestral, unique soundtrack for Super Mario Galaxy.

Check out this other, fairly recent interview with Kondo, where he talks more about his work with the Mario series as a whole, and his own personal musical influences. Very cool and informative as well!  Lastly, enjoy this week's arrangements from Super Mario Galaxy: Bunnies, Power Star, Sad Story and Space Junk Galaxy! More on the way!