Ah Final Fantasy. In the world of video game music, Final Fantasy is king. A simple search for that game series on www.vgmdb.net gives you hits for 386 albums and counting (that's right - albums). The music of the Final Fantasy series, composed entirely by Nobuo Uematsu until only recently, has always been popular among fans. But it was the arrival of Final Fantasy VII that exploded the series' influence on the industry. The music of Final Fantasy VII became required performances in nearly every single video game concert around the world. The soundtracks to Final Fantasies VIII, IX and X included not only original orchestral tracks, but also pop songs that became hits in Japan, including one by Hong Kong superstar Faye Wong. Concerts dedicated entirely to Final Fantasy toured the world throughout the 2000s and continue to do so.
However, before all that there were some other arrangements of Final Fantasy music. The 1990s saw a few songs performed at the Game Music Concerts. Each game starting with FF3 had its own studio album and each game starting with FF4 had an album of piano arrangements. But the very first album of arrangements from the game series was called "Symphonic Suite Final Fantasy", released way back in 1989. It featured music from the first two games, performed by the Tokyo Symphony Orchestra and arranged by none other than Takayuki Hattori and his father Katsuhisa Hattori.
At this point I should probably make the disclaimer that, sadly, I have never actually played through a Final Fantasy game myself. The only one I own is the first game in the series (bought from the now defunct chain of used game stores, Funcoland) and the cartridge crashes after a few minutes of playtime. But I have come to love the music of the games, from the orchestral concerts to the piano albums to the heavy metal arrangements by Nobuo Uematsu's personal rock band, The Black Mages. "Symphonic Suite" is no exception.
The album is divided into seven "scenes" which each contains arrangements of one or more songs. This song, "Scene III", begins with what should be recognizable to Final Fantasy fans - even those who jumped into the series late. It's the "Prologue" to Final Fantasy I, which has since become something of a theme to the entire series (not to be confused with "Prelude", the instantly recognizable series of ascending and descending notes that opens nearly every game) "Prologue" plays at the beginning and end of many games in the series, as well as over the end credits of the movie "Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children". Following that theme is the game's town theme at 2:06, followed by the truly beautiful "Matoya's Cave" at 2:46. The prologue returns at 4:37 to finish off the track. The first four songs on the album, which includes this one, were arranged by Katsuhisa Hattori. Katsuhisa deserves credit for his arrangement of the prologue, which has been used repeatdly, and for the most part unchanged, over the last 23 years.
Enjoy!
Album info: http://vgmdb.net/album/394
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