Are There Any Up-And-Coming Composers?
 

The title of this topic is misleading. I'm sure there are plenty of up-and-coming composers around. I welcome any suggestions for composers that should be sought out.

But I want to bring up the perception problem. The industry has its heavyweights (Mitsuda, Sakimoto, Huelsbeck, Follins -- just to name a very quick few). The majority of them made their bones in the 80s and 90s where creativity ruled over synth quality and videogames could be regarded as a niche. Nowadays, if you name the canon of composers, I believe almost all of them would have similar beginnings.

So, I guess, are there composers just in the past few years who ascended to the pinnacle? And if not, why not? Are we (and game companies) too smitten with bigger names to put others on the same level? Are we continuing to turn inward when we should be turning outward?

While I haven't heard anything else, aside from Luminous Arc and his Brawl arrangements, but Shota Kageyama might be someone to keep an eye on. I liked his contributions to the rather lackluster Luminous Arc soundtrack. While his arrangements in Brawl were rather straightforward, I enjoyed them, especially his Legend of Zelda one. I wonder where he is now since he left Procyon Studio.

Definitely jumping the gun here, but Procyon Studio's new composer, Shunsuke Tsuchiya, might be an up and comer. Of course, I haven't heard anything from him. However, the prospect of the Breath of Fire III team (my favorite BoF soundtrack), Shimomura (although probably really limited), and this new composer working on Luminous Arc 2 does seem to interest me more than the first one.

Masafumi Takada has been making a lot of hits lately (killer7 and No More Heroes, to name a couple). He's been composing for a while, but only now has he seemed to get recognition.

Masashi Hamauzu comes immediately to mind. He seems to be claiming the helm of the music of Final Fantasy after the departure of Nobuo Uematsu. His debut started with Final Fantasy X and since then he arranged the piano collection for it, scored FF7 Dirge of Cerberus, and will be composing Final Fantasy XIII.

Final Fantasy aside, Hamauzu has scored SaGa Frontier II, Chocobo's Mysterious Dungeon, Musashi Samurai Legend, and the upcoming Sigma Harmonics. He certainly has the potential to achieve greatness.

Yeah, the industry is mostly ruled by people who have been around since the late 80s / early 90s even though many are now freelancers. But there is some new talent for sure.

Focusing on Japan, I'd definitely agree with Masafumi Takada and Jun Fukuda. Though Takada dates back quite a way, he's now often talked about. Same goes for Shoji Meguro and Takeharu Ishimoto that orient their music towards the mainstream sector. Others to look out for are Norikazu Miura, Sota Fujimori, Asuka Ota, Kimihiro Abe, Mitsuhiro Kaneda, Hideyuki Fukasawa, and Osamu Kubota.

Also, look out for more Norihiko Hibino. He's becoming a powerhouse of the industry with music production company GEM Impact and his international affiliations. Amazing this guy hasn't been around that long.

Personally, I'd describe Masashi Hamauzu as a fully fledged composer (he's been around for 13 years!). Pretty sure Shota Kageyama won't be back, though Procyon Studio has potential to be an important game audio developer. It's achievements with the DS are very impressive.

I recently heard someone from Odin Sphere that has the potential to become some second Hamauzu. It's Kimihiro Abe. There is something about his rhythm and harmony that makes his compositions interesting. In perticular I'd recommend to listen to "Battle in the Labyrinth city".

Looks like Mr. X mentions him too.

Pretty much all the Basiscape mini-composers (except Iwata, who's been around for ages) have the opportunity to be up and comers if they get more solo work. In a way, it's not unlike Hans Zimmer's studio, which saw composers like John Powell and HGW work as understudies before branching off on their own.

I'd add Masayoshi Soken, who I think has potential as a composer, Takeharu Ishimoto, who I think should leave the field immediately and never return, and Takayuki Mitsuhara, whose work on Deep Labyrinth was rather impressive.

On the Western side, keep an eye on James Hannigan, who's set to break out after his Harry Potter score. I'm very interested to see what Chris Tilton does next as well.

Yes exactly, a perception problem.

Official soundtrack releases are more likely if the composer is already known or the game company is known for releasing VGM outside the games themselves.

If you like to find out about "up-and-coming" composers you need to look what doesn't get published. And even then you need to double check since just like the majority of VGM never gets official releases the majority of VGM composers are very obscure.

Btw. I can't be the only one scratching my head over your mention of Follins as industry heavyweights considering Geoff Follin stopped doing VGM ages ago and Tim Follin regularly complained being incapable to make enough money for a living by composing VGM since that job is terribly underappreciated. He officially stopped doing VGM after Lemmings PSP.

I'm not sure if Basiscape intends to see its composers branch out. Masaharu Iwata, who used to do a LOT of solo works in the NES years and to a lesser extent subsequently, now practically always works in a secondary collaborative role. Mitsuhiro Kaneda, who has been at the company since 2004 now, works on more high-profile projects but essentially never in a solo role. I personally think it is a shame as Kaneda, Abe, and Iwata are so talented although projects like Odin Sphere and Deltora Quest definitely served to increase their profile among the observant. But for the time being it looks like the whole 'Main Theme by Hitoshi Sakimoto, Other Composition by Masaharu Iwata, Mitsuhiro Kaneda, Kimihiro Abe, Noriyuki Kamikura' approach will continue.

As far as I know, Takayuki Mitsuhara has only arranged two tracks on Deep Labyrinth. That was a couple of years ago so, like Shota Kageyama or Tomoko Imoto, I think he's someone that probably won't return.

Perhaps not, but that doesn't preclude them from leaving the company to strike out on their own.
I found that a bit odd too. Perhaps in terms of western VGM fan appreciation they're heavyweights, but that's a niche.

Most of the composers are in Basiscape because of security. Masaharu Iwata's career was essentially dead until he joined Basiscape, limited to just sound effects and sound programming jobs aside a cancelled project and Tactics Ogre: The Knight of Lodis. Mitsuhiro Kaneda had even less prominence at Opus and similarly Azusa Chiba wanted more than just being a hentai / doujin composer. Noriyuki Kamikura and Kimihiro Abe are both university-trained salary men for the moment. (Manabu Namiki is an exception who has used Basiscape mainly to increase his workload and connections while remaining quite independent.) I think these composers will all have to establish individuality within Basiscape before having a chance of making it big as freelancers. At the moment, most employees work on five to ten projects a year and secure a decent salary in doing so despite not being exactly famous.

I can agree with both statements. :)

How could you guys forget Go Shiina.

Go Shiina is nice, but his discography is so small that we need to see more of him to start mentioning him.

Not really, Go Shiina has been pretty active lately.

That is, if you like iDOLM@STER...

Not that small. Masaru Shiina has been active since 1997 and has worked on a large number of projects. As well as his Tales of Legendia, Kyo Kara Maoh!, and Mr. Driller projects, he has contributed to Ace Combat 3, Klonoa of the Wind, Tekken Dark Resurrection, The Idolm@ster (whose inflated discography puts me off ever trying to cover him), and quite a few other works. I think he is a colourful versatile composer, though a tad overrated.

Really! I'm going to check those out. I just didn't find anything about Go Shiina, a few years ago I couldn't even find a picture of him...

I dont know how he could be overrated Mr X. I work with him often, even on a project that is currently progressing and I get extremely positivve comments from everyone I work with. That includes people like Mr Koh Otani who claimed he is one of the most talented "younger" stock of composer in Japan to engineers at Fox Studios.

To be honest, I don't know his reputation "punlicly" but I do not believe, freom all the people who I have seen comment about him, that he is overrated. I am pretty impressed with his latest work I did, although you won't hear it till September as it won't be released till then.

Anyway, I'm pretty scared of your reply Mr X, you usually come up with a devastating reply.

On another note, what about Derek Duke?

Derek Duke has been working at least since Starcraft in '98, perhaps earlier. With that, WCIII, and WoW, I'd say he's arrived.

Agreed. We're going to be publishing something with Kubota-san in the near future, so be sure to watch for it!

Yeah, while Derek Duke has worked on a number of high profile titles, the fact that he's in-house at Blizzard means that he likely won't be making a name specifically for himself because he works so closely with the team. I'm looking forward to his work on Starcraft II.

It's excellent to know he's so well critically received. I find his works can be occasionally superficial, but as I said I think he's a very colourful and consistent composer. By overrated, I was more referring to the fact that he seems to get a lot more individual credit than a lot of his Namco contemporaries. I have a lot of respect for the works of Keiki Kobayashi and Yu Miyake, for instance, but they don't seem to have acquired much of a fanbase despite having many well-received works.

I think I'll take that as a compliment. There was a time when I was nice and fluffy, but then dark things happened to me. :p

Lookin' forward to it!