Music of the ''Shadow Hearts'' series

Shadow Hearts Original Soundtrack Plus1

The music for the original Shadow Hearts was composed by Yoshitaka Hirota. Hirota worked on the game's music alongside Masaharu Iwata, Yasunori Mitsuda and Ryo Fukuda.^[7] Hirota had originally worked on Koudelka creating sound effects.^[8] Mitsuda was both an old friend and a frequent collaborator with Hirota on their earlier projects for Square, contributing around ten songs to the soundtrack.^[8][9] Iwata had previously worked on the score of Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together, while Fukuda was brought in by Hirota based on their past experience working on the score for Sonic Shuffle.^[7]

When creating the soundtrack, Hirota wanted to make the soundtrack a successor to the "Gothic" style used by Kikuta for Koudelka, using his background in sound design when creating the music.^[10] The director Itakura gave Hirota's team a basic synopsis of the game's setting and premise.^[11] Hirota's intent was to make the soundtrack "beautiful yet destructive", not wanting players to think it was like a movie score. The soundtrack included over fifty songs, which was a large project for Hirota at this time. He used elements of punk, new wave industrial rock, techno, electronic rock and orchestra. His aim was to create "personal, future ethnic music".^[7] Upon first hearing the result, producer Jun Mihara as shocked, as to him the music sounded like a random jumble of genres that somehow fitted together. Despite the shock, he was impressed with the young team's efforts, which motivated him to make the game itself match these images.^[11]

The game's vocal elements had multiple contributors; the main theme "Icaro" and several additional vocals were provided by Kyoko Kishikawa, while the ending theme "Shadow Hearts" was sung by Hiroko Kasahara.^[7] "Icaro" was put together quickly for an internal demo, wanting it to be "short yet striking". Its use in the game's opening sequence where the main protagonist saves the main heroine was intended to show the game's focus on these two characters. Later versions of "Icaro" were used to connect back to that scene and its meaning.^[8] The lyrics of "Shadow Hearts" were written by James H. Woan, with lyrics in both Japanese and English.^[12] Track titles were also created by Woan.^[13]

A 2CD soundtrack album for the game, Shadow Hearts Original Soundtrack Plus1, was published by music label Scitron on June 18, 2001.^[9] A reprint of the album was released on January 19, 2005.^[14] The album was praised by music critics.^[14][15]

Shadow Hearts II Original Soundtrack

Composition for Shadow Hearts: Covenant, known in Japan as Shadow Hearts II, was led by Hirota.^[16][17] Mitsuda returned from the original Shadow Hearts, along with series newcomers Kenji Ito and Tomoko Kobayashi; Kobayashi, a staff member at Sacnoth, was responsible for writing some short story-related pieces.^[16] The soundtrack includes over sixty songs.^[18] Mitsuda contributed between five and six solo pieces, along with working on a few collaborative tracks.^[16][17] The music for the game, as included on the soundtrack album, was composed between June 2002 and the end of 2003.^[16]

According to sound director Hirotomi Imoto, he asked the composers to take the original sound for Shadow Hearts, deconstruct it and rebuild it.^[18] Due to the game's shift in tone compared to the original, Hirota wanted a soundtrack that was more dynamic and emotional without surrendering the signature sound of Shadow Hearts. Mitsuda had difficulty during early production as he wanted to adapt his music to better fit the Shadow Hearts universe, but at Hirota's insistence he maintained his own style and it was fitted into the game's overall score. Covenant was Ito's very first project for the PS2, his first time working with Hirota and Mitsuda, and the first time he ever collaborated on a major track, this being the final boss theme "The 3 Karma".^[16] "The 3 Karma" was co-composed by Hirota, Mitsuda and Ito.^[16][17] The piece came together after the three composers had a private meeting, and after the speed and tempo were set each was allowed to go in their own direction. Because of the battle's style, a limited number of instruments were used for the theme.^[10] During the recording process, there was a combination of scripted music and improvisations from the performers.^[16]

The previous game's main theme "Icaro" was included as a part of the soundtrack, with Hirota rearranging it while preserving its core musical notes.^[8] The game's ending theme "Getsurenka" was written by Hirota, with lyrics by Kumiko Hasegawa, and performed by Mio Isayama.^[16] The ending theme was described by Itakura as the "true feelings" of main heroine Karin.^[3] Its tone, according to the producer Asako Oikawa, was decided upon once he and Itakura had decided upon the game's ending. The lyrics were intended to be the words Karin wanted to say to Yuri but was unable to before the game's ending. Upon receiving the request, Hasegawa was inspired by their combined effect with a near-full moon outside to turn off all the lights and write the lyrics by moonlight, creating them as a love poem. Isayama was so impressed by the emotion within the lyrics that she "sang from [her] heart".^[16]

A 2CD soundtrack album, Shadow Hearts II Original Soundtrack, was published by Team Entertainment on March 24, 2004.^[17] Critics praised the album's music, finding many tracks superior to those in the original Shadow Hearts.^[19][20]

Shadow Hearts: From the New World Original Soundtrack

Composition for From the New World was once more led by Hirota, who was joined by Fukuda and newcomers Tomoko Imoto and Hirotomi Imoto, the latter also acting as sound director. Due to the game's setting of the Americas, the soundtrack made heavy use of ethnic instruments and vocals, with the overall theme being "thirst"; this was meant to evoke both the desert environment and people's thirst for connections.^[21][22] For the lyrics, the team used both Latin and Italian.^[22] The production of the soundtrack, as with the rest of the game, was on a tight schedule and caused trouble for some members.^[21]

Before starting on the score, Hirota researched the cultures of Native American tribes, seeing a shared belief in coexistence with the world that informed his concept for the game's music. After his research, he came up with the concept of ancient instruments fusing with modern electronic elements, which would become the main theme of the score.^[8] Hirota handled the majority of the tracks, with his first completed piece being the theme "Dream Catcher", which played during a key story sequence.^[21] Fukada, who had previously had relatively minor roles for the last two Shadow Hearts titles, was invited by Hirota to contribute solo tracks to the score. Fukada acted as both composer and arranger for the game. Imoto was a Nautilus employee whom Hirota had met when they were part of the band for a live concert.^[10] A number of ethnic instruments were used throughout the score, including a didgeridoo and a cajón. Their use tied into the game's setting of the "new world".^[21]

As with Covenant, the series' main theme "Icaro" was used in an arranged form.^[8] The choral work for the game was led by Akiko Shikata. During her work on the chorus segments, including the spirit sequences, she had to redo several of her tracks so they would come off as primal, with one piece needing to be redone when Imoto rung her up and complained that it sounded like a "men's festival"; she adjusted it so it sounded more ceremonial. For one early segment set inside a theater, Shikata used a famouls aria from the opera Idomeneo by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, working it into the game's environment due to its dark tone. The chorus work included the use of Tuvan throat singing for some tracks including "Dream Catcher" and the opening theme "Great Ghost Dance".^[21] The game's ending theme "Spread My Wings" was composed by Hirota, and written and sung by Takehara Tomoaki.^[21][23]

A 2CD soundtrack album, Shadow Hearts: From the New World Original Soundtrack, was released by Team Entertainment on August 24, 2005.^[23] The album received positive reviews from music critics.^[24][25]

Koudelka Original Soundtrack

The music for Koudelka was composed by Kikuta, who had previously composed the scores of Secret of Mana, Seiken Densetsu 3 and Sōkaigi for Square; he wrote the music alongside his roles as the game's director, producer and writer.^[4][26] Kikuta found composing the score the easiest part of development due to mainly working on his own. His concept for the musical elements of Koudelka were created alongside the setting and narrative.^[4] The score was arranged by Kikuta and Nick Ingman.^[27] To compose the most of the game's tracks, Kikuta used Atari Notator sound software. While he found the lack of compression an issue, the better sequencing compared to the software he used for earlier games was very useful when creating the score for the CGI cutscenes.^[28] Due to there being a smaller amount of music than the average RPG, the score was completed within six months.^[5] Rather than having looping tracks like his earlier work with Square, the soundtrack of Koudelka used ambient sounds and short tracks related to cutscenes outside of battle themes. The game featured influences from church music. The opening vocal theme "Requiem" was performed by Catherine Bott, while the ending theme "Ubi Caritas et amor"—taken from a larger composition by Maurice Duruflé—was performed by the London Oratory School.^[27]

The soundtrack album for the game, Koudelka Original Soundtrack, was published on December 1, 2016 by Pony Canyon, featuring over an hour of music across 34 tracks.^[29] The album included all tracks from the game, and live versions of three of the battle themes arranged by Naoya Akimoto.^[27] Harry Simons of Video Game Music Online gave a mixed opinion of the album, praising several tracks but finding the rest either lacking or poorly written.^[30] RPGFan's Patrick Gann was highly positive about the game's music aside from the live tracks, which he referred to as "a bomb".^[31]

Reviewers of the games were divided about the soundtrack. GameSpot's Ike Sato called the soundtrack "simply amazing",^[32] and Jake Alley of RPGamer enjoyed most aspects of the music while finding the battle themes clashed with the game's tone.^[33] David Zdyrko of IGN was unimpressed by the environmental music and called the battle themes "very worst... [that have] ever been used in a console role-playing game."^[34] Ken Chu, writing for RPGFan, found the soundtrack disappointing compared to Kikuta's previous work.^[35] Dutch magazine Power Unlimited was particularly scathing, calling the music "a disaster".^[36]

Near Death Experience: Shadow Hearts Arrange Tracks

Planning for the arrange album Near Death Experience began as Hirota was producing the soundtrack of From the New World. The album's title derived from his opinion that senses were interconnected.^[10] The main wish of Hirota was to rid himself of the practical side of music development, which had previously restrained his creative abilities for the Shadow Hearts series and involved working with multiple composers who stuck to their own styles due to time constraints. For the remixes, Hirota decided to experiment with his own style while retaining the core of each track.^[8]

The album was published by Team Entertainment on August 24, 2005. The album featured tracks from all three Shadow Hearts games, covering compositions by Hirota, Mitsuda, Ito and Imoto.^[37] The two music critics who reviewed the title had split opinions on the album despite generally liking the tracks included.^[38][39]