Nobuo Uematsu Composer - Final Fantasy
Nobuo Uematsu is a Japanese video game composer known for composing the music for the majority of Square Enix's Final Fantasy RPG video game series. Uematsu was born on March 21, 1959. He has established himself and built a reputation as one of the best composers in the video game industry. He is responsible for the music for timeless pieces such as "Dancing Mad," "To Zanarkand," and many others. He also works extensively outside of the video game industry, composing the main theme for the 2000 anime film Ah! My Goddess: The Movie while co-composing the soundtrack for the anime Final Fantasy: Unlimited (2001) with Final Fantasy orchestrator Shiro Hamaguchi. He also released a solo album in 1994 titled Phantasmagoria. Uematsu also formed Black Mages, a band consisting of Uematsu and two other Square colleagues, Kenichiro Fukui and Tsuyoshi Sekito, and released three studio albums.
Early life
Uematsu was born in Kochi Prefecture, Japan. There, he became a self-taught musician, beginning to play the piano at the age of twelve. He also comes from a musical family, as his older sister also plays the piano. He has cited Elton John, who eventually became a major influence on Uematsu. Uematsu graduated from Kanagawa University with a degree in English and, after graduating, played music with small bands and composed music for television commercials. He began working at a music rental store in Tokyo and was approached by a woman who offered to create music for Square, which he accepted. At first, he viewed the job as a side gig and was skeptical of its full-time potential. Therefore, Uematsu kept his other job until he finally landed a full-time position at Square.
Career at Square Enix
Uematsu joined Square full-time in 1985 and composed the music for a name titled Cruise Chaser Blassty, where he eventually met Hironobu Sakaguchi , who then asked him to work on some of his games. The first few, like Genesis and Alpha, turned out to be failures, but that all changed with the release of Final Fantasy , a game that turned out to be a phenomenal success. After the release of Final Fantasy , Uematsu went on to compose music for over thirty other titles, the most famous of which were for the company's flagship Final Fantasy franchises. He continued to work independently and was solely responsible for composing the scores for games until Final Fantasy X , released in 2001. This game is the first game for which he did not entirely compose the soundtrack. For Final Fantasy 11 , he was joined by Naoshi Mizuta, who composed the majority of the music, and Kumi Tanioka; Uematsu was only responsible for eleven tracks. His responsibilities for the next installment were even less extensive, as he only composed the main theme for Final Fantasy XII None.
Freelance career
In 2004, Uematsu established his own production studio called Smile Please. Then, two years later, in 2006, he opened a music production company and record label called Dog Ear Records. Uematsu left Square because the office was moved to Shinjuku, an area he felt uncomfortable in. Uematsu also cited personal reasons and abandoned a work-centric life. He still contributes freelance to Square Enix projects, and his band, The Black Mages, composed the music for the CGI film Advent Children of Final Fantasy VII. Uematsu has also contributed to Hironobu Sakaguchi's game development studio Mistwalker on several projects, including Blue Dragon (2006), Lost Odyssey (2007), Away: Shuffle Dungeon (2008), The Last Story (2011), and Terra Battle (2014). Uematsu was also responsible for creating the main theme for the hit fighting game Super Smash Bros. Brawl in 2008 and composed the music for the anime The Guin Saga . He is also working on the music and script for an e-book titled "Blik-0 1946." In September 2018, Uematsu announced that he would be taking a year off and putting his projects on hold due to health reasons.
Personal anecdote
Some of Uematsu's favorite pastimes are drinking beer, riding his bike, and watching professional wrestling. He aspired to be a professional wrestler when he was younger. He lives with his wife, Reiko, whom he met in college, and their beagle, Pao, in Tokyo. He has a summer home in Yamanakako, Yamanashi. Many fans like to refer to Uematsu as the "Beethoven of video game music," and he has received numerous awards and recognition for his current and past work. Although he is a video game composer, his works have been performed in many unexpected places. At the 2004 Summer Olympics, a piece from Final Fantasy VIII was performed for the women's synchronized swimming section. Uematsu is also one of the few game composers to have received an award at the Japan Gold Disc Awards.
