Nobuo Uematsu Composer - Final Fantasy
Nobuo Uematsu is a Japanese video game composer renowned for scoring the majority of titles in Square Enix’s Final Fantasy RPG video game series franchise. 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 scoring timeless pieces such as “Dancing Mad”, “To Zanarkand”, and countless others. He works extensively outside of the video game industry as well, composing the main theme for the 2000 animated film Ah! My Goddess: The Movie while also 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 named Phantasmagoria. Uematsu also formed Black Mages, a band comprised of Uematsu and two other Square colleagues, Kenichiro Fukui and Tsuyoshi Sekito and has released three studio albums.
Early Life
Uematsu was born in Kochi Prefecture, Japan. There, he became a self-taught musician that started out by playing piano at only twelve years old. He came from a musical family as well, as his older sister also played the piano. He listed Elton John, who ended up becoming a major influence for Uematsu. Uematsu graduated from Kanagawa University with a degree in English, and, upon graduating, made music with small scale bands and composed music for television commercials. He began working at a music rental store in Tokyo and was approached by a woman who gave him a proposal to create music for Square, to which he agreed. At first, he viewed the work as more of a side gig and was skeptical that it would pan out to full-time work. As such, Uematsu kept his other job until he eventually took 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 actually turned out to be a phenomenal success. After the release of Final Fantasy, Uematsu went on to compose music for more than thirty other titles, the most famous of which were for the company’s flagship Final Fantasy franchise releases. He continued to work independently and was solely responsible for composing the scores of the games up until Final Fantasy X, which was released in 2001. This game was the first game that he did not fully score. With Final Fantasy 11, he was joined by Naoshi Mizuta, who composed the majority of the score, and Kumi Tanioka; Uematsu was just responsible for eleven tracks. His responsibilities for the next installment were even less significant, as he only composed the main theme for Final Fantasy XII.
Freelance Career
In 2004, Uematsu formed his own production studio named Smile Please. Then, two years later in 2006, he opened a music production company and record label named Dog Ear Records. Uematsu left Square because the office was moved to Shinjuku, an area he was not comfortable with. Uematsu also cited personal reasons and moved on from a life centered on work. He still contributes as a freelancer to Square Enix projects and his band, The Black Mages, scored the music for the CGI film Final Fantasy VII Advent Children. Uematsu also contributed to Hironobu Sakaguchi’s game development studio, Mistwalker, on a number of 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 successful fighting game Super Smash Bros Brawl in 2008 and scored the music for the anime Guin Saga while also working on the music and storyline for an e-book called “Blik-0 1946”. In September 2018, Uematsu announced he would take a year off from touring and put his projects on hold due to health reasons.
Personal Trivia
Some of Uematsu’s favorite pastimes are drinking beer, cycling, and watching professional wrestling. He desired to become a professional wrestler when younger. He lives with his wife, Reiko, whom he met during 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 many prizes and awards for his present and past work. Despite being a video game music composer, his works have been played in multiple places that might be considered unexpected. In the 2004 Summer Olympics, a track from Final Fantasy VIII was played for the women’s synchronized swimming section. Uematsu is also one of the few game music composers to receive an award from the Japan Gold Disc Awards.