Koji Kondo

Koji Kondo is the famous composer of most of the music from the The Legend of Zelda series and many other Nintendo franchises, including Mario.

Koji Kondo was born on August 13, 1960 in Nagoya, Japan. Even at an early age, he was composing simple little tunes. When he was seventeen, he decided to make music his profession.

In the 1980's, he heard of a gaming company, Nintendo, that was looking for musicians for its new gaming system, the Nintendo Entertainment System. Although he never considered video game music before, Kondo gave it a chance in 1983. It was odd to Kondo: Suddenly, he was limited to four instruments, due to limitations in the NES chips.

Kondo has been both praised and criticized for his use of recognizability and familiarity in his compositions. He is recognized for his ability to create themes that are catchy when first heard, and still remains enjoyable while looped. However, he has also been criticized for not varying his style more during his two decades as Nintendo composer. However, when Kondo tried to create something different for the Ocarina of Time soundtrack, he was again criticized by some for abandoning many of the familiar themes from previous Zelda games, such as the Legend of Zelda Main Theme (Overworld Theme from A Link to the Past).

To this day, he still works for Nintendo, having composed music for the SNES, the Nintendo 64, the Nintendo Gamecube and the Wii. This allows him to greatly expand upon his original visions in older games, and today he records his music with CD quality to his name.

He has composed the music to The Legend of Zelda, A Link to the Past, Ocarina of Time, Majora's Mask (with Toru Minegishi), The Wind Waker (with Kenta Nagata, Hajime Wakai, and Toru Minegishi), and Twilight Princess (with Toru Minegishi and Asuka Outa), just to name a few. His music has become very well-known and popular, going so far as to have the Super Mario Bros. theme becoming one of the best-selling ringtones!