Music of the Kingdom Hearts series

The Kingdom Hearts series features an extensive array of music that contributes greatly to the identity of the series as a whole. With over 500 unique music tracks, ten original soundtracks, numerous compilation and arrangement albums, and several live concert performances, the Kingdom Hearts series has a rich musical history that plays an important role in the franchise.

Yoko Shimomura is the primary composer for the series, with Tsuyoshi Sekito and Takeharu Ishimoto joining for later entries. Utada Hikaru created the theme songs, while a number of other artists have made arrangements and orchestrations for the series.

Terminology

Certain types of music tracks in the Kingdom Hearts series are divided into categories. "Field themes" are played when exploring a specific world outside of battle. "Battle themes" are songs played during combat – "boss themes" are a special type of battle theme used in boss battles, while "world battle themes" are used for standard enemies in a given world. Together, field themes and and world battle themes comprise "world themes".

Some specific characters have their own music theme used outside of battle, called "character themes", which almost always use the name of the character as the title of the track. Special tracks played during scripted events, such as cutscenes or mandatory encounters, may be referred to as "event themes". Additionally, some songs may fall into multiple categories under different contexts, while others may not belong to any of these groups.

Original soundtracks

Kingdom Hearts

The soundtrack for Kingdom Hearts was composed entirely by Yoko Shimomura. Nearly 100 original tracks were made for the game.^[1] The international release of Kingdom Hearts featured two additional tracks, and Kingdom Hearts Final Mix included a further two more. A small handful of tracks were arrangements of existing Disney, Final Fantasy, or classical pieces, but the majority of the soundtrack was wholly original. Hikaru Utada composed the theme song pair, "Simple and Clean" and "Hikari".

Shimomura composed the soundtrack with the idea of having short, contained musical phrases that would connect different pieces together.^[2] Several tracks near the game's climax incorporated the melody of the title theme, "Dearly Beloved"; songs relating to the Gummi Ship all share a two-measure melody; numerous songs relating to darkness are connected by a three-note motif: shared phrases such as these tie the soundtrack together.

Kingdom Hearts Chain of Memories

The Kingdom Hearts Chain of Memories score consists of nearly 50 compositions, all by Yoko Shimomura. Just over half of the soundtrack is new arrangements of pieces from Kingdom Hearts, while the rest are new compositions. The original Game Boy Advance versions of these tracks have never been released on an album.

Due to the limitations of the Game Boy Advance, sound compression was a more important issue than it was for the first game on the PlayStation 2; as such, returning world themes were given new simplified arrangements. Very few tracks other than world themes are carried over from Kingdom Hearts, allowing the game to form a distinct musical identity. While short themed phrases are still implemented in the game – for instance, tracks relating to Organization XIII share a similar descending chromatic pattern – the soundtrack is not built around these common phrases in the same manner as Kingdom Hearts. Rather, similarities in instrumentation give the Kingdom Hearts Chain of Memories soundtrack structure.

GAME TITLE

First paragraph: Information

Main composers, arrangers, orchestrators
Development notes (e.g. differing releases)
Theme song (where applicable)
Released in an album?

Second paragraph: The music itself

Musical analysis (where applicable)
Hardware limitations?
Common instruments/techniques?
Reusing tracks, or original arrangements?

Kingdom Hearts V CAST

Because Kingdom Hearts V CAST was produced independently of Square Enix's development process, Yoko Shimomura did not return to compose the score. Instead, the soundtrack was created by Ian Livingstone, his only contribution to the Kingdom Hearts series. The soundtrack is only ten songs long, with four of those being five-second jingles. According to Livingstone, the entire score was likely created in the span of one month.^[3] None of the tracks have ever been released on an official album.

The hardware limitations of Verizon phones severely restricted the scope of the soundtrack.^[4] Each world has only a single theme, and each theme loops in under 30 seconds – the Wonderland theme, for instance, is only 14 measures long. Although the soundtrack is devoid of any explicit motivic material from Kingdom Hearts, Livingstone took style and instrumentation cues from that game's soundtrack: the use of a descending piano pattern in several tracks was inspired by "Dearly Beloved", and Livingstone made stylistic decisions in the themes of returning worlds Wonderland and Agrabah that evoke similar tones to Shimomura's existing field themes.^[5]

Other games

The spin-offs Kingdom Hearts Mobile, Kingdom Hearts Magical Puzzle Clash, Kingdom Hearts Digital Painter, Kingdom Hearts Re:coded Gummiship Studio, Kingdom Hearts Collaboration: Gummi Ship Campaign, and Kingdom Hearts VR Experience do not feature any original music. These promotional and companion releases may borrow tracks from full Kingdom Hearts titles — for instance, Kingdom Hearts Mobile offered ringtones from Kingdom Hearts and Kingdom Hearts II, while Kingdom Hearts Magical Puzzle Clash used two songs from Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days – but they do not contribute to the discography of the Kingdom Hearts series.

Arrangements and orchestrations

Short blurb about piano collections, orchestral concerts, etc.

Notes and references

^ Kingdom Hearts Ultimania, Yoko Shimomura: "Also, the number of songs on the CD soundtrack was 76, but the game’s data actually has 99 songs. I said, "I don't want to have any more than 100!" and I stopped at 99." (Translation by KH Ultimania)
^ Kingdom Hearts Ultimania, Yoko Shimomura: "I used small themed musical phrases for this game. For example, the main song is a phrase that expresses "precious memories", and that phrase was used in some other songs. Scattered fragments of that phrase was used in the End of the World's song, but were you able to catch that?" (Translation by KH Ultimania)
^ Q&A with The 13th Vessel, Ian Livingstone: "The developer Superscape had some deal with Verizon and were doing lots of fast turnaround titles at the time – think I did roughly one a month."
^ Q&A with The 13th Vessel, Ian Livingstone: "We had such a tiny amount of memory available for the mobile midifiles the pieces had to be very short."
^ Q&A with The 13th Vessel, Ian Livingstone: "I did listen to Shimomura's excellent soundtrack for style and orchestration, the descending high piano motif that appears in a few of my cues was definitely a nod to her main theme, but I was also conscious to write an original score which is what was needed."

[1] Kingdom Hearts Ultimania, Yoko Shimomura: "Also, the number of songs on the CD soundtrack was 76, but the game’s data actually has 99 songs. I said, "I don't want to have any more than 100!" and I stopped at 99." (Translation by KH Ultimania)

[2] Kingdom Hearts Ultimania, Yoko Shimomura: "I used small themed musical phrases for this game. For example, the main song is a phrase that expresses "precious memories", and that phrase was used in some other songs. Scattered fragments of that phrase was used in the End of the World's song, but were you able to catch that?" (Translation by KH Ultimania)

[3] Q&A with The 13th Vessel, Ian Livingstone: "The developer Superscape had some deal with Verizon and were doing lots of fast turnaround titles at the time – think I did roughly one a month."

[4] Q&A with The 13th Vessel, Ian Livingstone: "We had such a tiny amount of memory available for the mobile midifiles the pieces had to be very short."

[5] Q&A with The 13th Vessel, Ian Livingstone: "I did listen to Shimomura's excellent soundtrack for style and orchestration, the descending high piano motif that appears in a few of my cues was definitely a nod to her main theme, but I was also conscious to write an original score which is what was needed."

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[2]

[3]

[4]

[5]

Music of the Kingdom Hearts series

Contents

Terminology

Original soundtracks

Kingdom Hearts

Kingdom Hearts Chain of Memories

GAME TITLE

Kingdom Hearts V CAST

Other games

Arrangements and orchestrations

Notes and references

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