Yoko Shimomura reflects on Kingdom Hearts music after BAFTA honor in latest Square Enix interview

Square Enix's blog recently interviewed composer Yoko Shimomura after she won a BAFTA Fellowship, the highest honor an arts organization can grant. 

Throughout the interview, Shimomura answered questions about the award, how she came to compose video game music, and her involvement with specific titles, including the Kingdom Hearts series. 

You can view the relevant quoted portion of this Shimomura interview below. It delves into her impressions of Kingdom Hearts as a project and the creativity involved with both Disney Worlds and original world music. 

Quote

When you were invited to take on KINGDOM HEARTS as a project, what were your initial impressions of the game?

Shimomura: I was a bit surprised when they explained to me what songs they wanted me to write - there was quite a gap there.

I thought: “wait, it’s a Disney game, but you want that kind of song there? That kind of track there?” So, I was quite surprised at the difference.

Many of the Disney properties have such a strong existing musical identity. Was it daunting to create your own tracks for these worlds?

Shimomura: Yes, like you say, there is that difficulty there. And you have to try to achieve a balance there because if you’re too aware of the original music and that’s too much in your head, it becomes difficult to make anything new.

On the other hand, you also want to watch out for the fact that you’re not just doing a rehash of the original work, or the original music from the Disney songs. If it sounds too close, it just becomes derivative of that.

I didn’t focus on expressing my identity with the tracks. I was only thinking to myself: “What will be accepted by fans as new tracks that represent the specific Disney world?”. So, I explored ways to create such tracks.

Of course, I had already watched a number of Disney films at that point. So, I tried to look at it from the fan perspective. I always thought, “Ok, as a fan of this Disney work, is what I’m making right or does it feel out of place?”

So, generally I worked on that basis. I didn’t really try hard to put my own personality or color.

Of course, the series features a lot of original stuff, from characters like Sora and Riku, to new worlds like Hollow Bastion. What inspired the music for these elements?

Shimomura: For the original stuff, I was mainly inspired by the visuals, the backdrops, and the visible elements of those environments.

For Hollow Bastion, for example, I actually got the game, played it and walked around inside the world to get a feel for the place. I really tried to create something based on the visual impressions it gave me.

So, in general, the key factor for the original content was: what are the visuals like, and how do we represent that through the music?

You can view the full interview on Square Enix's blog, which also contains comments about Live A Live and Final Fantasy XV.