The Man Who Scored My Entire Childhood

Old video game music means more to me than most things people would call real music. I know how that sounds. The Metroid theme is lodged somewhere in my brain in a way that nothing from the last twenty years can touch—I can hum it from memory, probably could in my sleep. A large portion of the credit for that belongs to one person: Hirokazu Tanaka, known to fans as Chip Tanaka or "Hip" Tanaka, Nintendo’s longtime composer and one of the most quietly influential figures in the history of electronic music.

He wrote the soundtracks for Dr. Mario, Donkey Kong, Metroid, Tetris, Super Mario Land, EarthBound—earworms so structurally perfect that they’ve outlasted entire genres that came after them. In late 2014, he played a 30-minute live set at the Red Bull Music Academy’s "Cart Diggers" event in Tokyo, a celebration of Japanese video game music that also spawned a documentary series worth seeking out. The recording of that set is one of those things you put on and then just sit there staring at the middle distance, genuinely moved by music made from eight bits and pure intent.

He also wrote a farewell piece for Hiroshi Yamauchi, Nintendo’s longtime president, and if you grew up with any of these games it will wreck you. It’s the kind of music that knows exactly what it’s doing to you and does it anyway. Thank you, Hirokazu. For all of it.