Fun Fact: During an interview with Mozart, he admitted that during his childhood, he played a lot of Pokemon, so a lot of his music were inspired by Pokemon. That's why they're so similar.
Videos like this really make me question how we approach academia. You can spend years studying the art of music, to try to articulate how Mozart must have definitely composed this song made by a contemporary Japanese person to evoke the feeling of riding a bicycle in a children’s game.
I love that they determined it from all this fancy music theory and were all “ah yes but this one doesn’t have the third minor florbledip so it must be Pokémon.” And I’m like “DATS THE BIKE SONG.”
Me, brute-forcing my way through this with 20+ years of Pokemon music burned into my skull: Wow, I'm really good at understanding Mozart's musical signatures.
I haven't played half of the pokemon games they have shown and don't listen to classical music. Yet somehow I got a 9 out of 9 despite them sounding very similar. I can't explain how, I just could tell whether it "felt like pokemon" to me or not (not counting the obvious themes from the first gen). I don't know if I just got lucky on the ones I didn't know, but this was a really weird experience.
@@bouboulroz first few generations of pokemon had to have the music all fit on Gameboys so I think anyone who played OG sorta just has pokemon ears now if that makes sense lol. Like GB's were 8bit so gen 1-3 music is quite limited in the different sounds they could use, so more recognizable patterns can be established in repeated players.
The biggest thing that sticks out to me about a pokemon song is that they seem to set up a resolution at the end of the sentence for looping the track, whereas Mozart doesn't. So when the end of the 2nd measure comes around and my brain expects it to start over, instead of continuing whatever progression, that's my biggest tell
Agreed. For me it's also obvious to me that Pokémon adds more notes, sometimes quickens the pace and what sticks out to me is that Pokémon sounds more modern and not quick but it feels like it's more like it's summarizing itself before I've heard the real, story? That's what I've gathered. I've taken Choir for all my years of Middle School, one year was Band and Choir. And so far for two years of High School I've been in Choir. I'm not at all a musical scholar or whatever but a huge goal in life is to be one lol. Edit: I know no one needed to know that extra stuff but I just wanted to say that, not to just tell the world that I'm in Choir or whatever but to just say that I at least have a reason to explain this much about this music? I dunno.
I loved this video idea! I got all of them right, and tbh, I basically know nothing about Mozart, but I know everything about Pokémon hahah. So it was as simple as: "Oh, this one IS from Pokémon" or "Never heard this one in any Pokémon game before, therefore, it's Mozart" hahaha. I would love to see more videos like this!
Same here. Except I listen to Mozart regularly and this video made me realize that they have a lot of similarities. Interesting how some ornaments can make them sound different at first listen
@@alexmunoz9529 Yes, they really do! I love how Nintendo's 2 biggest composers come from 2 totally different "schools" of composition, with Koji Kondo basically being a Jazz composer and Junichi Masuda being a Classical composer. Also, goes to show how important orchestration is! Once the other instruments kicked in, it was clear to them which was Mozart and which was Pokémon. Amazing concept for a video.
For each one, they have a deep, technical discussion, that I can barely understand, to determine the composer. Meanwhile, I'm just sitting here, yelling "EASY, that's the Bicycle Theme from Red, Blue, and Yellow!"
@@inakiaraquistain5731 No? Of course not. Mozart wrote over 600 pieces according to a Google search, typically way longer than your average piece in a video game. And it's not like Mozart is the only composer of classical music to have existed. Why would you assume they can recognise every Mozart piece based on a few seconds of music?
@@inakiaraquistain5731 when studying old compositions it wouldn’t make sense to listen to 1 a hundred times and then move on to another since there are SO many compositions and composers. But in Pokémon the only music you listen to is what’s on each route so a typical Pokémon player will here that tune every time they pass that area making it a lot easier to subconsciously memorize
It does feel odd as a layman to recognize Mozart immediately when they are debating it and so unsure. I get they have a lot of music in those brains, but I feel like Mozart has quite a few pieces that are just widely recognizable anyway? I knew most of them from nostalgia, having heard them as a child and/or in movies. It's just interesting.
This illustrates how ALL aspects of music are important. We elevate the composer, but the way it is played, the instruments used, the production, the medium, the cultural connotations, even the environment in which we are listening affect how music is perceived.
also the counterpoint and technique - a melody can be super simple and intuitive but Mozart has a way of weaving counterpoint that makes it sound richer. But the SS Anne theme also has that tenor line that sounds so good. EDIT: FIGURED BASS TOO
If anything, this is showing the OPPOSITE. It's pretentious to think that Mozart's music is better than Pokémon's, a music professor couldn't even tell the difference. The "way it is played, the instruments used, the production, the medium, the cultural connotations, even the environment in which we are listening" do not matter. There's a reason people love Pokémon games music so much, it's because it's good music.
@@yuzan3607 I think you completely misunderstood my comment. That's what I'm saying. Those things are SUPER important to the way music is PERCEIVED. I didn't make any claims about which was better. However, the subtext of my comment implies neither.
Watched a compilation of Mozart's progression from like aged 4 till 40ish and it was clear that a LOT of video game music is influenced by him. Being in the public domain helps a lot with it too.
Junichi Masuda clearly mentioned many classical artists, like Bach, shoshtakovich (spelling) inspired him. It is actually because of the music limitations of generation 1 consoles, He had to study classical music for inspiration for meeting hardware requirements and it actually worked.
Love this challenge. Dragon Quest vs a classical composer would be very interesting too. The Dragon Quest soundtrack is known for being very classically inspired.
@@tiff1913 How pretentious. Even if someone has an affinity towards a skill, they'll still have to train and put in the work to be great/stay on top of things.
The funniest fact about this is that you can play it even if you have no idea about one of the two things, because it is then just “Mozart or not” or “Pokémon or not”!
This was the only Mozart one that I actually knew as a piece of music from outside of this video, so it was an easy one for me. I heard it, and went ‘It’s definitely Mozart, I’ve heard it before.’
i'm glad i'm not the only one who noticed! it really is almost the same melody, the Pokemon Center version is just slightly simplified from the Mozart one, and has gone on to have several variations. it feels to me as if Junichi Masuda heard the Mozart piece and wanted (and succeeded!) in giving it new life. it may not be in the form of the original composition, but it means so many things (childhood, nostalgia, simplicity, the 90's, chiptune, safe space, etc) to a lot of people now, and that's worth something, isn't it?
I think the biggest difference is that Pokemon music is generally crafted to be listened to on repeat in quick succession. If you're on a route or in a battle or on a bike, you hear the same music on repeat. Mozart wasn't specifically planning for his audience to listen to the music multiple times immediately after having just heard it, so it isn't built to be repeated.
Pro tip for distinguishing Mozart and Pokémon themes: try to find the one that can be played on loop in perpetuity that one is the Pokémon theme. Although Mozart music is usually centered around a theme, seldom is that theme the thing on repeat, usually it’s restated in context with other contour, harmonies, etc.
@@gargaduk In most of the examples you could (usually) tell if it was meant to be looped depending on if the last chord was unresolved and the first one was resolved. Pokemon music does it like that (or the other way around) because that way the jump between the beginning and end of the track doesn't feel jarring.
@@neyok3198 yep, but thats exactly why this works so well, pokemon music is usually composed around a few parts that loop by themselves or together, which most non pokemon/game music doesn't do
For the Cinnabar Island theme, there’s a much “happier” version than the one you played. Between the two games where this place exists, the island’s volcano erupts and the town is abandoned, you heard the post-eruption music.
@@Alex_Eh thats pretty much as far as it goes. in pokemon red/blue, cinnabar island is happy and cheerful. in the games sequels, gold/silver, they are not. this is because of the island being struck by a volcano eruption. in both games they have the same melody, but at different tempos and with different instruments to represent pre-eruption vs post-eruption
@@Alex_Eh The pokemon series can be confusing in how they constantly re-release old games with new graphics. The story of red/blue/yellow is the same as firered/leafgreen and Let’s Go Pikachu/Eevee. If you look up the Cinnabar Island theme from any of these games you’ll get the cheerful music. Gold/Silver/Crystal were made to be sequels to the Red/Blue/Yellow story, and HeartGold/SoulSilver are basically the same as G/S/C. However, in G/S/C, the music that plays on Cinnabar is not related to the cheerful theme from the first games. In HG/SS, though, the original music is remade into a gloomy version of itself, that’s the music that plays in the video.
@@Alex_Eh Cinnabar Island has a volcano. In Red/Blue the town is small but cheerful with a cutting edge laboratory, an abandoned chateau where scientists were experimenting with clones and a gym. Gold/Silver occurs three years after the events of Red/Blue, at some point in those three years the volcano erupted and the town is no more. Everyone was evacuated on time luckily, but there's nothing in the island anymore.
Honestly i hope this helps people see that "video game" music is real music. To hear about how a teacher taught a lesson on music theory about pokemon would literally be the most heart warming thing ever. These video game music composers are geniuses themselves too.
Nintendo has one of the best video game music composed. Lets scrap that and make it Japanese. Some real composing geniuses are behind a lot of japanese developed games. Zelda, Metroid, final fantasy series all have amazing pieces.
Scala radio in UK has a scheduled program called "The Console" hosted by Luci Holland 60mins of video game music, broadcast over the air each week. not sure if its available outside the UK
A big tip of the hat to Junichi Masuda, the primary composer for the Pokemon franchise. I suspect he's a big Mozart fan given how similar the melody and song structures are when stripped down to their basic elements.
He was mostly just on battle theme duty after GSC. Go Ichinose, Hitomi Sato, Shota Kageyama and Minako Adachi all made most Pokemon music starting from RSE.
as soon as a piece in 13/16 came about (looking at you, final battle from OoT, you beautiful masterpiece) it would be a dead giveaway. Koji Kondo has a very distinctive style that's immediately recognizable, so trying to make a video comparison with him in it would be a lot of fun, but probably incredibly easy.
The stalfos theme from Skyward Sword sounds just like Tchaikovsky, especially at 0:16 when it sounds exactly like Swan Lake. th-cam.com/video/1ilC01aCgF4/w-d-xo.html
I think one of my favorite pieces is the kanto/mewto battletheme in x and y. Also the song thats played by the kimono girls before the ho oh battle starts in heart gold. But there are so many good pokemon songs its incredible
This challenge is so interesting. To clear this, you either have to be an extremely talented musician with a lot of knowledge of musical history, or just really good at a 24 year old game you played as a child. 😂 And I proudly fall in the latter
For me there is slight rhythmic alterations between Mozart and Pokémon and a good understanding of Pokémon rhythm and some basic structures of Mozart. So yeah all that helped me get them all right
There are a lot of things to take into account when evaluating a composer's work and that is indeed one of them. They were all limited in one way or another.
@@GameyRaccoon It very clearly is indicated as being 8-bit, the CPU is a modified Sharp z80. It's sound chip has 4 sound channels: 2 square waves, 1 programmable wave and 1 noise generator.
This is awesome. The other day I heard Rite of Spring by Stravinsky and could have sworn it was from a Pokémon game, it’s general familiarity without putting my finger on where I knew it from. So there’s definitely classical roots in Masuda’s writing style that continued to influence music in Pokémon games he didn’t compose for.
You probably already know but Rite of Spring can be clearly heard in the opening of One Winged Angel in ff7 so it definitely goes to show how groundbreaking it was and how important it still is. You wouldn't be surprised if someone told you it was from 100 years later. The same part is also the main melody of the Shark theme by John Williams of course
@@BloodrealmX I'm sorry but "tacky butchering of music" sounds a bit harsh for one of the most important and famous video game compositions ever. And also even if you're convinced of that it doesn't change the fact that the opening of that piece is directly derived from the rite of Spring and even deaf people would recognise it, so there is musical importance and relevancy. (Btw I wasn't a big fan of One Winged Angel either until I heard it live in a theater and it blew the whole room away)
@@BloodrealmX it doesn't sound that great on a ps1 but a live orchestra makes the ps1 version sound like child's play. it's absurd hearing that song played live.
Well, I scored 100%. For me, Mozart melodies want to grow to become other things (deveolpment during the pice), while Pokemon, due to the nature of the looped music, tend to be repeatable. That Mozart symphony (number 5 question), for example, going from a minor context to a major relative.
Mozart's music tends to have each phrase make a distinct statement, yet that statement is an unresolved part of a larger whole. Pokémon themes tend to not say as much, and yet resolve as if they weren't really going anywhere in the first place. I did get one wrong, but got 8/9 paying attention to this idea.
It seems easier for a pokémon fan to recognise music that doesn't sound like pokémon, than for a composer to recognise music that doesn't sound like Mozart. I didn't recognise any of these songs (apart from Awakening/Heartwarming - though I didn't recognise it when it was simplified), but pokémon music seems to have a very distinctive sound.
Of course, mozart is a composer who made these pieces to match various styles while pokemon is just a series with a coherent style. I'm sure if you did Mozart vs all the works of Junichi Masuda (the composer for the pokemon games), it'd be more difficult.
Yeah, it was fascinating - I got all of them right as a Pokemon fan, but that included the Pikachu's Adventure theme, which I had never heard before. I figured it had to be from a game I hadn't played or just didn't know that well, because something about it sounded too Pokemon to me.
Makes sense. Mozart obviously is older than Pokémon so Pokémon's composers can be inspired by him and add their own elements. It's easier to distinguish the added elements once you can recognise them than it is to distinguish the original from something it influenced.
@@lukedetering4490 In structure though, they all are very similar. If you play it all on the same instrument, without knowing which game it comes from, they'll sound very similar. (I guess not counting S+M onward)
I love the concept of this video, but as someone with trained ears who frequently transcribes Pokémon music for fun, it bugs me that a number of chord progressions in these simplified arrangements are incorrect lol. mm.7 of the bike theme should be a ii going to a V instead of being a V right away, the pedal point for the first four measures of St. Anne isn’t accurate, the V7 chord on m.1 beat 3 of Cinnabar should be a ii in second inversion, etc etc. Add to that the fact that Gen 1 Pokémon music has been rearranged and reharmonized several times at this point, even within official media, and you kind of have a mess haha.
When I tried to figure out where the St. Anne music came from, I ended up associating it to the Pokemon Sapphire Oceanic Museum, which is ironically also using the same theme, but slowed down and with more emphasis on the main melody. The various remixes in Fire Red almost remove the main melody entirely. It's fascinating how many remixes and alerations there are to some of the main melodies.
Trust me, the Mozart ones are as incorrect if not more, on one of the examples you can hear 3 g major chords 3 bars in a row, something Mozart would never have done in that way, and when you look at the original you can see that there is a D major on every third beat.
@@z.a.4801 Yes, this should have been pure melody instead of bad simplified arrangements. The chord progressions were simplified in a way that made almost all of them sound really unnatural. Weird voicings, weird bass notes, bad voice leading...
@@z.a.4801 I was really irritated that they omitted the leading note in one of the Mozart examples. That's the reason why they both felt it couldn't be Mozart and why they both looked uncomfortable on those chords. Makes the whole excercise pointless.
I’m glad there was Mystery Dungeon representation because the PMD series has such amazing music that the series is almost more known for its music than its gameplay
@@10meisterballe I said almost. It’s not an attack on the stories of the games, I think most of them are wonderfully written and much more complex than the main line games without being overly convoluted or watered down. They treat the kids that are their intended audience with the respect of assuming they’re actually intelligent. However, I was saying that the PMD music absolutely slaps. It’s some of the best video game music I’ve ever heard
@@jaredadkinson Also, gameplay and story are two separate elements, so you're right. Without the music and the story, it would be nothing more than a dungeon crawler.
#5 was incredibly different. It didn’t feel classical, it felt like you were entering the climax of a Pokémon journey. Yet I couldn’t help but pick Mozart.
#5 really wasn't arranged correctly. The original mozart had a B natural in the viola part and implied the harmony for the full 2nd measure is a G7, but the arrangement incorrectly assigned a Bb, completely changing the chord, harmonic sequence, etc, and it being a typo Bb was the entire basis for why one them even guessed Pokemon instead of Mozart
The original Cinnabar Island music is quite cheery. The reason the one in the vid is slower is because in the Red/Green/Blue/Yellow games, Cinnabar Island was a thriving touristy community with a Pokémon Gym. But between Red/Green/Blue/Yellow and Gold/Silver/Crystal, the settlement was destroyed by the island's volcano and the Cinnabar Gym Leader Blaine had to move his Gym to the nearby Seafoam Islands. The slower music in HeartGold and SoulSilver for Cinnabar Island reflects what happened to it. The only building present on the island is the Pokémon Center. I love how cheery Pokémon music tends to be, it motivates you as you continue on your journey. So this Mozart vs Pokémon game was easy for me.
@@PudimRebaixado "And if we invert the order and dont count the last 4 letters, that forms MOZART" No, that forms MolZaArti. If you don't count the last FIVE letters, you get MoZArt, also known as one of the really common fan names for the fused Legendary Bird we see in the Pokemon Adventures manga. Also 1. don't beg for pins. It's cringey and self-important. 2. Pretty sure you can't pin a reply to a comment.
Yeah, Pokémon music is so mozartian. It's childlish, graceful, magical, funny and deeply melodical at the same time. I love both and this challenge was sort of easy for me lol. You could put every Mozart sonata on a PKMN game and it would fit there perfectly. I've enjoyed a lot this video.
I think what gives away some of the Pokémon ones are how the melody doesn’t start on the downbeat. Back on the gameboy, it could only play 4 pitches at once, so it usually played the bass note and start of an arpegiating chord on the downbeat, and then the melody came in on the next beat. It really forced the composers to write songs around the hardware at that time, so even when the track was remastered on more powerful hardware, it still had the same structure.
Wow. I do remember that TH-cam channel 'Retro Game Mechanics Explained' touched on the audio capabilities of the original Game Boy in one of their videos, but I don't think they ever did a video specifically about what you mentioned.
True though pokemon has been on hardware that can do much more now, so those restrictions don't apply. Though I guess artists will be more inclined to keep the themes of their older work around.
@@Roboshi2007 Exactly. By the time the series got to that significantly better hardware, Pokémon music had developed a distinctive sound and it would've been weird for the fans if they'd heard something too different. It's really developed into something of a proto-genre by this point, same as a lot of the classic composers.
This was fun! Number 5 is an interesting one! I've been listening to Mozart for over 30 years and recognized the melody right away. The left hand part throws things off a little. Anyways, back to what makes this particular piece so interesting... It was neither originally composed by Mozart, nor was it a Pokemon tune. It was actually the andante of Carl Friedrich Abel's Symphony in B-Flat Major, Op.7. It was earlier misattributed to Mozart, because it was copied as a study piece by the young Mozart (then only 8 years old!) while he was visting London. A manuscript of the symphony written in his hand exsited and was categorized as his 3rd in the first complete published edition of his works. Mozart did change the score a little by replacing the oboe parts with clarinets and changing the key to E-Flat Major. I just thought I would share this interesting tidbit of info, because it illustrates the fact that even great composers start out by copying, studying and adapting the the works of established professionals. Everybody has to start somewhere! Mozart studied and assimilated the styles of prominent composers of his time, such as C.F. Abel, J.C. Bach, C.P.E. Bach and many others to eventually evolve into the masterful, influental composer we know today!
Musical memory is amazing. Even though I haven’t played some of the Pokémon games on the list in years, my brain was still able to recognize them. The Pokepark one was especially surprising; I haven’t played that game since I was a small child, but my brain was STILL able to recognize the melody after all this time, even though I couldn’t remember which game I had heard it from. I got every one right just from the sheer strength of musical memory, since these games were really special to me growing up.
Same, I don't know where its from, I think it might be HGSS or Yellow, the PokePark version still good tho I ended up getting all but the last one(and none of the bonus round) almost entirely off "I know Pokemon Music in my heart, if it does not resonate with that memory its probably the Mozart's genius instead"
This was interesting especially since I’m a composer who likes Pokémon. A lot of the game’s soundtrack was inspired by classical music which makes sense and I think it’s pretty cool
As a Japanese-American, I grew up listening to Japanese music as well as classical music and something about the Pokémon harmonies and melodies feel more Japanese while Mozart’s feel European.
To be specific, if I listened through the entire peace and felt like it had “flavor” I picked Pokémon, if it listened and went “Hm don’t really feel any flavor” I went with Mozart. I’m halfway through and have gotten everything right so far. Edit: nvm I got one wrong
Having listened to Pokemon music continuously from age six to now, it was easy to identify the Pokemon ones but it's really interesting to hear how they compare and contrast to Mozart Also, the Cinnebar Island theme at 8:56 is a really unusual arrangement of that song. Most of the games that feature this song have a much faster melody. I'm assuming it was turned into this slow, music box theme to reflect how the island city had been destroyed in this sequel installment
A lot of the timing on some of these transcriptions sound off to me. They don't sound correct even with a remix or alteration in mind. Some are just skip too slow or too fast to what they typically would be. I don't know. I wish my dad played Pokemon haha, I could ask him. I dropped learning more about music theory and reading music earlier on, while he's done it his entire life, even professionally.
@@UmbraStarWolf You're not disagreeing with the OP. HGSS is a remake of a sequel to the original series of Pokémon games. In the original the music is more upbeat, but in the second generation, a volcano decimated the island and left us with this dreary mood shift.
I love how I came into this from the exact opposite point of view as you. You kept looking into the music theory and seeing if it sounded like Mozart, meanwhile I was just listening to see if it sounded like Pokémon.
The Cinnabar Island theme has some interesting stuff going on that this quick game unfortunately couldn't accomodate. If you'll indulge me: The simplified sheet music rendition is more similar to the theme in the original Pokémon Red and Blue versions, which is upbeat and uptempo. In the sequels Gold and Silver, the slower, melancholic rendition shown in the video plays. The reason for this change? In the time between when Red/Blue and Gold/Silver take place, the volcano atop the island erupted, destroying the small town that fans were returning to. That slow and quiet performance is a reflection of the player's sadness as they revisit a burned-down town from memories past.
What I find fascinating is that this quiz uses simplified piano versions of the tracks, and yet doesn't include a single Sinnoh track (the pokemon region most known for its excellent piano music).
Ah, yes, the region known for great piano music, like the nighttime pokemon center theme, or the home town theme, or THE TRACK. We all know THE TRACK. It's our version of one winged angel. And we all learned the meaning of humility to it.
I think it was such a big missed opportunity to not include Cynthia's pre-battle music. So if you should decide to make another one of these, please have this one in it. And great video btw!
I have limited classical knowledge but I’m pretty sure Cynthia’s pre theme, while classical isn’t based on the style of Mozart particularly. They will know it right away.
@@RadenWA i mean some of these others ones they are stumped on are pretty obviously not Mozart either haha. But yes they could do it again with a Romantic Era composer and it would be a better fit!
Why Pokémon game soundtrack sounds so similar to Mozart music scores is because the Pokémon composer, Junichi Masuda was inspired by a lot of movie and classical scores.
It blows my mind that people still refuse to believe video game music is at the same level as great musicians. The amount of times I’ve shown somebody a song and had them react positively until I tell them it’s from a game and all of the sudden they hate it…
This popped up in my recommended and I'm so glad it did, what a wonderful concept! If you wanted to expand this into a series, the music that Nobuo Uematsu did for Final Fantasy would be another great selection. Thank you for helping bridge the gap between classical listeners and video game fans, I strongly believe that video games have given us some of the most interesting and compelling contemporary classical music of the past three decades.
Honestly, just seeing them react to Dancing Mad would be good enough for me. Uematsu really just decided to give Kefka an entire four movement arrangement for his theme and I'm all for it.
I love their breakdowns because as soon as i hear a pokemon song im like yea it’s pokemon and pokemon gives it self away because i feel like it has a signature a feel to it that makes it distinct
Early 8-bit games could only have 3 voices sounding at any given time, so it almost forced the composers to use a more contrapuntal style to fill the most space possible
@@JesusProtects Sort of. MIDI music is made by a computer and is basically code to tell the computer how to play the song. Like if the song was a script, to be read out and played. 8bit music basically is midi music but while only allowing a max of 4 voices: either 4 notes or 3 notes and a percussion layer (not much better sounding).
This really shows how the instrument choice makes a huge difference and how good video game music is from simple melodies to complex compositions. Great video!
@@bobsala7780 Nah, that would be like the easiest challenge ever, unless it's specifically neo-classical metal. The melodic and harmonic vocabulary of classical are vastly different from metal.
I don't know - I got number 6 wrong (having not played Mystery Dungeon or any game where this theme appears obviously). There were 2 or 3 notes in there that got me thinking "That does sound wrong for Pokemon", but then again, I do think that Pokemon may have had different composers over the years.
I only got the Pikachu park one wrong; I can see why this might be hard if you're not familiar with Pokemon, but there's a certain theme tying almost all of their music together if you're familiar with it.
@@james64ibm Pokemon Mystery Dungeon was made by Hudsonsoft instead of Gamefreak, so it usually has a different vibe to its music. The final boss/level themes in particular are pretty distinct from most of the mainline games.
I've heard several famous Mozart pieces, as well as a lot from main-series Pokemon, but most of the spin-off games are completely unfamiliar to me. Out of the 8 pieces, the bike theme was the only one I recognized immediately, but I still got most of them right just by asking myself "could this be looped infinitely without driving the listener mad, or is it meant to go somewhere else after this?"
The only Pokemon song I recognized was the bike theme but I was able to get them all right. If you play enough video games (maybe RPGs in particular?), even if you haven't played a lot of Pokemon, you can kinda get a feel for what what environmental themes sound like. They usually don't have much build up and instead quickly establish the mood of the area
@@EmperorZ19 Same experience as you! I found it really interesting how despite me having no music theory knowledge at all and them having a deep technical intellectual discussion incorporating music theory, I was able to be more successful at identifying which composition belonged to which category with 100% accuracy. I don’t even listen to Mozart and based my judgements purely on whether or not it matched that environmental Pokemon video-game aesthetic. I wonder if despite their music theory knowledge, they’re just lacking in enough exposure to Mozart or video game music or a combination of both. 😅 It’s really amazing how the patterns and feelings that music evokes can run much deeper than it’s surface gradeable, intellectual, and mathematical merits.
@@DeletedChannel379 It's 8 songs, if you randomly guess on average you should get 4 out of 8. So yeah, if you hit 7 out of 8 that was quite impressive.
The fact that there even is a challenge to differenciate the music of mozart from the Pokemon themes speaks for itself. The creators of the Pokemon themes are the real underappreciated heroes (Gen V especially :D)
@@Sebb_Music he has a REALLY good Turkish march remix that’s remixed off of attack of the killer queen from deltarune. I listen to it regularly, it’s so good
Mozart's repertoire is too large for anyone other than a dedicated scholar to have heard all his songs. Meanwhile you listen to every track while playing the game. So this video is essentially obscure Mozart comps vs common Pokemon songs
@@ApathyBM eh the mystery dungeon & pokepark songs are pretty obscure as far as the whole series goes, the first few pokemon songs though definitely are pretty common
@@ApathyBM there is like 5hours of Ost for pmd alone I think there is a lot of obscure pokemon jinggles there are like 30 pokemon games. But its impressive how many nice little melodies the pokemon games have, one of the things game freak somehow held up the quality off
The thumbnail definitely got me to click, and the incredible content got me to stay. Thanks for the fun watch! It helps a ton that you don’t know too many Pokémon songs
Really appreciate the historically informed recordings! 😊 Next you should try Castlevania vs Baroque composers! Some pieces like the Wood Carving Partita from Symphony of the Night could easily pass.
It's gonna be easier because they don't have Bach or Handel works written when they were five years old (or written by someone else, like the Symphony #3 which wasn't actually written by Mozart). It wouldn't be as easy to confuse any of the adult compositions of those composers.
I love video game soundtracks; they’re catchy but more dramatic than standard pop music. It warms my heart when video game music gets some serious attention (like at the Tokyo Olympics when I recognized Robo’s theme from Chrono Trigger).
i recognized proof of a hero from the monster hunter saga. its a song that really gives you the vibe of being the last standing in front of adversity, and being able to surpass it
Cool video, I got them all right. Funny Mark's strategy seems to be associating things Mozart would do while mine was the opposite, I kept associating them to Pokémon. Guess that happens when you love Pokémon like I do.
Yea we realized that we were relying heavily on harmony and voice-leading which kind of missed the point! If we do another one of these we will strip it down to just the melody
@@RyanLeach I really wish they’d included “Approaching Champion Cynthia”, although I guess that sounds more Romantic than Mozart Edit: Volo’s battle music includes the same theme
Note that the Cinnabar island one isn't always that slow. In Pokemon Gold & Silver it is, because the majority of the island was destroyed by a volcano eruption. In Pokemon Red/Blue/Yellow it's about the same speed as the example piece: th-cam.com/video/VBby1E3tWwo/w-d-xo.html
I have heard it said that all modern-day music is based on Bach; in that it is derived from someone, who derived it from someone, who derived it from someone, who derived it from Bach. Makes me wonder if maybe "Bach or Pokemon" would be even harder to tell apart.
I don't know anything about music but I'd still bet money that somebody somewhere is singing something that can be traced back to traditional folk music written by people who never had the capacity to ever hear anything that could be traced to Bach.
@@RyanLeach haha! I’d love to get involved, although I’m not familiar with dragonquest so that idea may not work as well. Perhaps have a think about any other formats you can think of and send me a message to my email 😃 I’d love to collab 😀
Could you both do an episode on temperament? It could be fantastic to introduce people how temperament changes things- equal temperament was only introduced in 1917 AD. The unequal temperaments are so much fun - every key has its’s own character!
The Cinnabar Island theme from Red/Green would have been a more accurate reflection of the simplified version you played because the Heart Gold/Soul Silver rendition is used for a completely destroyed Cinnabar Island after a volcano eruption so it's meant to be a little somber.
A bit advantaged here since I listened to a lot of classical music growing up and am pretty familiar with Pokemon music in general, even without knowing the exact songs, there are pretty distinct telltales signs from classical music of Mozart's era that make it different from Pokemon music that I can't quite put into words. I would say only #7 was difficult.
@@Plasmariel Tell me the SS Anne theme wouldn't have fit as opening ambience to a summer time part at a villa in France. Add in some violins, some piano, and some flutes and you got a 18th century banger.
@@BrandonsUsername The SS Anne theme wouldn't have fit as opening ambience to a summer time pary at a villa in France. Not even close. It's a rambling directionless melody, which I suppose was the intention for a Pokemon theme but is completely unlike the well-structured pieces being written by trained composers of the late 18th Century.
It was a good observation that not all notes of the melody are retained in these simplified arrangements. I'm a fan of Pokemon, and when I heard the Bike theme I noticed the last stanza was cut, and it caused the sample to end somewhat akwardly.
A strategy you could try to use is to try looping the track. Pokémon and game music in general is typically designed to loop on itself and still sound good
I think traditionally a lot of game composers, especially in Japan have classical educations as something engraved in the culture. It shows through j-pop as well in the way they handle modulations and chord progressions overall. A joy to listen to and utterly fascinating to study/emulate.
@@BrianMagnan Yeah, Japan is quite likely the only (Eastern) Asian country that embraces Western culture earliest and most (say, starting mostly from the Meiji Reform). Even outside of the gaming industry and J-Pop the Western music influences in Japan can be well observed.
considering that classical is a sort of starying point to learning music. we can assume that game, anime and even modern pop composers study them at some point. so it should not be much of a surprise if their music uses classic music as a foundation of sorts.
Something tells me Mozart would have been a huge gaming nerd. "So basically, with videogames I can have access to an enormous variety of great music and at the same time there are characters performing a play for me and only for me, and it is also interactive??? Whoever made this, give them a medal or something ".
I'm an avid player of Pokemon but I also have musical education up to the high school level. I got everything right and am super proud of myself! I really like it when game music has strong classical influences! :)
Great video and a great quiz! If I didn't already know the tracks from Pokémon, this would've been slightly harder. My only issue with the quiz itself is that Symphony No. 3 K.18 was not by mozart, but Abel.
I feel like these guys would've nailed everything if the arrangements weren't simplified. Being somewhat of a pokemon nerd *and* a music nerd, this was a super fun watch
The difference is clear if you see the entire scores. In this video only short segments are analyzed. If you listen to the entire melodies, it's clear that the ones of Mozart are more elaborated. In the soundtracks of Pokemon you basically find basic/static themes, while in the melodies of Mozart there is an extensive development.
@@june9914 In a forum of classical music in which I write, someone thinks that the best music of the 21st and 20th centuries has been composed by the soundtrack composers and not by the classical music composers.
Fun Fact: During an interview with Mozart, he admitted that during his childhood, he played a lot of Pokemon, so a lot of his music were inspired by Pokemon. That's why they're so similar.
did he say which one was his favourite?
@@infiltrate6807 Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Red and Blue rescue team
Mozart would have called it quits after gen 2
Mozart went deaf from listening to "Pokemon Platinum | Cynthia's Theme (10 hours)" on repeat.
fun fact: beethoven influenced the black 2 and white 2 remakes
this was fun bc its really boiled down for me to "its pokemon bc i recognize it"
same here except the one from the pikachu park thingy
SAME
EXACTLY
@BLACKFLAME4941 the pokepark games are some of the best games gamefreak has ever made. I loved those things as a kid.
Exactly, every gen 1 song nailed. And then, if you hear a trill step up it's 90% sure pokemon, because the music from those games loves trills
So interesting to see you guys talk all music theory, when my reasoning is always "I don't remember hearing this in pokémon so it has to be Mozart"
Exactly
Videos like this really make me question how we approach academia. You can spend years studying the art of music, to try to articulate how Mozart must have definitely composed this song made by a contemporary Japanese person to evoke the feeling of riding a bicycle in a children’s game.
@@maximilian6829I mean that’s a very stupid take ngl
@@scarletempress2652
Okay, why?
That's my reasoning too. I don't typically play Pokemon games with the sound on these days though.
People obviously are more familiar with “Pokemon” than the composer’s name but I think he should get more credit: Junichi Masuda 👍🏆
Just one of, more than just him
@@BigPumpie-tf7tq my point stands, at least credit one of them or more as a fellow musician lol
To think he originally made these on a dinosaur which forced him to get creative, genius
If you're putting it in quotes it should be "Pokémon"
@@Kimberedkey such an unnecessary comment.
I love that they determined it from all this fancy music theory and were all “ah yes but this one doesn’t have the third minor florbledip so it must be Pokémon.” And I’m like “DATS THE BIKE SONG.”
third minor florbledip is a pretty big giveaway you gotta admit
Third minor florbledip hits different…
"snaps fingers and points at the screen" "DATS THE BIKE SONG."
"Third minor florbledip" sounds like one of Justin Roiland's improv'd lines for an Interdimensional Cable ep of Rick and Morty
saaaame. Im so smart. pokemon songs be imprinted on my brain
Mozart must have played a lot of Pokémon growing up!
so cool to see how a simple game can influence huge musicians like him
So inspiring
Wrong, he's the one who made Pokemon
Mozart was ahead of his time and probably inspired GameFreak
@@Just-J2 I said Mozart made Pokemon
Next up: is it a jazz standard or a sinnoh theme?
Answer is: yes
Is it a Random Trumpet Noise or From a GBA Game?
Sinnoh music is boring
@@internetguy7319 n o
@@internetguy7319 you couldn't be more wrong
As a classical musician who grew up playing ridiculous amounts of Pokémon I feel like I was born for this
as someone with pokemon music burned into my memory, it was just trial & error lmao
as someone who plays classical music and Pokemon, it is a huge w
As a massive Pokemon fan who knows nothing about music theory and very little about classical music at all, I got a perfect score
Relatable my guy
Same ....
Me, brute-forcing my way through this with 20+ years of Pokemon music burned into my skull: Wow, I'm really good at understanding Mozart's musical signatures.
Got me like “Am I an expert on music theory? *maybe*!”
Yep. The PMD one I recognized instantly through "ah yes, I heard this in the Treasure Town PMD explorers cutscene"
to me i played so much zelda i can tell nintendo music
I haven't played half of the pokemon games they have shown and don't listen to classical music. Yet somehow I got a 9 out of 9 despite them sounding very similar. I can't explain how, I just could tell whether it "felt like pokemon" to me or not (not counting the obvious themes from the first gen). I don't know if I just got lucky on the ones I didn't know, but this was a really weird experience.
@@bouboulroz first few generations of pokemon had to have the music all fit on Gameboys so I think anyone who played OG sorta just has pokemon ears now if that makes sense lol. Like GB's were 8bit so gen 1-3 music is quite limited in the different sounds they could use, so more recognizable patterns can be established in repeated players.
The biggest thing that sticks out to me about a pokemon song is that they seem to set up a resolution at the end of the sentence for looping the track, whereas Mozart doesn't. So when the end of the 2nd measure comes around and my brain expects it to start over, instead of continuing whatever progression, that's my biggest tell
Well put
i noticed this since the intro; as soon as it reached the “end” i knew it was made to loop and was a pokemon theme
Definitely, mozart stuff feels like it's going to develop more imo
Agreed.
For me it's also obvious to me that Pokémon adds more notes, sometimes quickens the pace and what sticks out to me is that Pokémon sounds more modern and not quick but it feels like it's more like it's summarizing itself before I've heard the real, story?
That's what I've gathered. I've taken Choir for all my years of Middle School, one year was Band and Choir. And so far for two years of High School I've been in Choir.
I'm not at all a musical scholar or whatever but a huge goal in life is to be one lol.
Edit:
I know no one needed to know that extra stuff but I just wanted to say that, not to just tell the world that I'm in Choir or whatever but to just say that I at least have a reason to explain this much about this music? I dunno.
The loops aren't that short so it's just a coincidence if they seem to loop
Okay, this is a pretty genius idea.
Oh hey cool to see you here
OMG HI!!! im glad to see poketubers everywhere on my feed xD
My second favorite poketuber
You should do this with another poketuber but try to guess what game the song is from or the name of the song.
Oh you here? Love your vids and greetings from germany
This is making me want to hear Mozart music done in 8-bit game boy sounds to see if I can imagine the compositions in a Pokemon game
That's pretty much what you already do. The music in gen 1 was very much inspired by classical music
@@aurelia8028That's actually true.
@@aurelia8028but it's not Mozart :p
oh, dude, look up classical entertainment system. the guy does all that and more. he takes requests, too.
The bike theme i heard it and immediately imagined riding my bike up and down so its ingrained
I loved this video idea! I got all of them right, and tbh, I basically know nothing about Mozart, but I know everything about Pokémon hahah. So it was as simple as: "Oh, this one IS from Pokémon" or "Never heard this one in any Pokémon game before, therefore, it's Mozart" hahaha. I would love to see more videos like this!
Same here. Except I listen to Mozart regularly and this video made me realize that they have a lot of similarities. Interesting how some ornaments can make them sound different at first listen
Same lol
@@alexmunoz9529 Yes, they really do! I love how Nintendo's 2 biggest composers come from 2 totally different "schools" of composition, with Koji Kondo basically being a Jazz composer and Junichi Masuda being a Classical composer. Also, goes to show how important orchestration is! Once the other instruments kicked in, it was clear to them which was Mozart and which was Pokémon. Amazing concept for a video.
@@alexmunoz9529 Kinda makes you want to hear someone arrange Pokemon themes in the style of Mozart.
@@Picksqueal th-cam.com/video/1oGh_L-5AF/w-d-xo.html
For each one, they have a deep, technical discussion, that I can barely understand, to determine the composer. Meanwhile, I'm just sitting here, yelling "EASY, that's the Bicycle Theme from Red, Blue, and Yellow!"
You are not alone my friend
That's kind of why I don't believe them. If they really are composers, shouldn't they know all of Mozart's pieces already?
@@inakiaraquistain5731 No? Of course not. Mozart wrote over 600 pieces according to a Google search, typically way longer than your average piece in a video game.
And it's not like Mozart is the only composer of classical music to have existed. Why would you assume they can recognise every Mozart piece based on a few seconds of music?
@@inakiaraquistain5731 when studying old compositions it wouldn’t make sense to listen to 1 a hundred times and then move on to another since there are SO many compositions and composers. But in Pokémon the only music you listen to is what’s on each route so a typical Pokémon player will here that tune every time they pass that area making it a lot easier to subconsciously memorize
It does feel odd as a layman to recognize Mozart immediately when they are debating it and so unsure. I get they have a lot of music in those brains, but I feel like Mozart has quite a few pieces that are just widely recognizable anyway? I knew most of them from nostalgia, having heard them as a child and/or in movies. It's just interesting.
This illustrates how ALL aspects of music are important. We elevate the composer, but the way it is played, the instruments used, the production, the medium, the cultural connotations, even the environment in which we are listening affect how music is perceived.
also the counterpoint and technique - a melody can be super simple and intuitive but Mozart has a way of weaving counterpoint that makes it sound richer. But the SS Anne theme also has that tenor line that sounds so good.
EDIT: FIGURED BASS TOO
For me, the genius of Junichi Masuda is being able to create all these songs only with 8-bits.
And importantly, this is true of all art
If anything, this is showing the OPPOSITE. It's pretentious to think that Mozart's music is better than Pokémon's, a music professor couldn't even tell the difference. The "way it is played, the instruments used, the production, the medium, the cultural connotations, even the environment in which we are listening" do not matter. There's a reason people love Pokémon games music so much, it's because it's good music.
@@yuzan3607 I think you completely misunderstood my comment. That's what I'm saying. Those things are SUPER important to the way music is PERCEIVED. I didn't make any claims about which was better. However, the subtext of my comment implies neither.
Watched a compilation of Mozart's progression from like aged 4 till 40ish and it was clear that a LOT of video game music is influenced by him. Being in the public domain helps a lot with it too.
How so?
Junichi Masuda clearly mentioned many classical artists, like Bach, shoshtakovich (spelling) inspired him.
It is actually because of the music limitations of generation 1 consoles, He had to study classical music for inspiration for meeting hardware requirements and it actually worked.
route 1 theme in Kanto borrows pretty heavily from Bach's sheep may safely graze
yes it generally goes from 5 to 35 years old, he died at the latter age.
@@haaendaaz3619bro some of the Mozart sounds like it COULD be Pokémon
Love this challenge. Dragon Quest vs a classical composer would be very interesting too. The Dragon Quest soundtrack is known for being very classically inspired.
Good call maybe we'll do a Dragon Quest sequel!
@@RyanLeach Oh, please do!
@@RyanLeach please do!!!
@@RyanLeach YES PUHLEASE
Castlevania: Symphony of the Night would also be a great pick for this very reason as well.
“Who’s that Pokemon?”
…pikachu?
“IT’S MOZART!!!”
*FUUUUU-*
"thaat was Mozart" said Salieri.
Oh wait no that was Pikachu
Seen from above
Hahaha! But some pun on Wolfgang would unironically be an excellent name for a new Pokémon. It could evolve into a pun on Amadeus and then on Mozart.
@@Mariposa-11-2007 hell no
we don't need another uri geller situation
It goes to show that Junichi Masuda actually was trained classically at a young age!
Similarly, if they do this again, they could put in some of Tsukasa Tawada’s work.
Somebody like that is naturally talented, not trained like you people wish you could
@@tiff1913 How pretentious. Even if someone has an affinity towards a skill, they'll still have to train and put in the work to be great/stay on top of things.
@@thrownaway6020 don't worry about them, they're just lazy and making excuses
@@tiff1913 All I can read here is someone making excuses because probably they're unable to do anything well
The funniest fact about this is that you can play it even if you have no idea about one of the two things, because it is then just “Mozart or not” or “Pokémon or not”!
Yeah that’s how 50/50 works
@@xshxrcry more
@@joedavid4545and you still probably got 50/50 wrong
18:40 who ever made this quiz is so smart cuz the harmonic rhythm in this is definitely supposed to remind you of the iconic poke center theme
Absol-utely. I for sure thought that was what it was.
This was the only Mozart one that I actually knew as a piece of music from outside of this video, so it was an easy one for me. I heard it, and went ‘It’s definitely Mozart, I’ve heard it before.’
Oh now I know why this one got me the most! I was very sure it would be from Pokemon, while for the others i guessed correctly
Yeah, i thought it was the pokécenter theme
i'm glad i'm not the only one who noticed! it really is almost the same melody, the Pokemon Center version is just slightly simplified from the Mozart one, and has gone on to have several variations. it feels to me as if Junichi Masuda heard the Mozart piece and wanted (and succeeded!) in giving it new life. it may not be in the form of the original composition, but it means so many things (childhood, nostalgia, simplicity, the 90's, chiptune, safe space, etc) to a lot of people now, and that's worth something, isn't it?
I think the biggest difference is that Pokemon music is generally crafted to be listened to on repeat in quick succession. If you're on a route or in a battle or on a bike, you hear the same music on repeat. Mozart wasn't specifically planning for his audience to listen to the music multiple times immediately after having just heard it, so it isn't built to be repeated.
Exactly my strategy in guessing them
How can you tell it’s mean to be repeated
He can't, and being "built to be repeated" is meaningless, any 4 bar melody could be "repeated"
@@Marionettetc there was one where I reconised the loop point at the end which is what gave away to me that it was pokemon
Fun fact:
ArticUNO
ZapDOS
MolTRES
And if we invert the order and dont count the last 4 letters, that forms MOZART
This has to be one of the all time nerdiest videos on the internet and I'm 200% here for it.
And speaking of nerdy, "Across the Stars" could also fit Anakin Solo and Tahiri Veila.
I'm 300% here for it.
Pro tip for distinguishing Mozart and Pokémon themes: try to find the one that can be played on loop in perpetuity that one is the Pokémon theme. Although Mozart music is usually centered around a theme, seldom is that theme the thing on repeat, usually it’s restated in context with other contour, harmonies, etc.
But they only have little snippets to work with.
@@gargaduk In most of the examples you could (usually) tell if it was meant to be looped depending on if the last chord was unresolved and the first one was resolved. Pokemon music does it like that (or the other way around) because that way the jump between the beginning and end of the track doesn't feel jarring.
@@miroaja1951it’s still a snippet
What was your score?
@@neyok3198 yep, but thats exactly why this works so well, pokemon music is usually composed around a few parts that loop by themselves or together, which most non pokemon/game music doesn't do
For the Cinnabar Island theme, there’s a much “happier” version than the one you played. Between the two games where this place exists, the island’s volcano erupts and the town is abandoned, you heard the post-eruption music.
Wait really? Would you mind explaining the story behind that a little more?
@@Alex_Eh thats pretty much as far as it goes. in pokemon red/blue, cinnabar island is happy and cheerful. in the games sequels, gold/silver, they are not. this is because of the island being struck by a volcano eruption. in both games they have the same melody, but at different tempos and with different instruments to represent pre-eruption vs post-eruption
@@Alex_Eh The pokemon series can be confusing in how they constantly re-release old games with new graphics. The story of red/blue/yellow is the same as firered/leafgreen and Let’s Go Pikachu/Eevee. If you look up the Cinnabar Island theme from any of these games you’ll get the cheerful music. Gold/Silver/Crystal were made to be sequels to the Red/Blue/Yellow story, and HeartGold/SoulSilver are basically the same as G/S/C. However, in G/S/C, the music that plays on Cinnabar is not related to the cheerful theme from the first games. In HG/SS, though, the original music is remade into a gloomy version of itself, that’s the music that plays in the video.
@@Alex_Eh Cinnabar Island has a volcano. In Red/Blue the town is small but cheerful with a cutting edge laboratory, an abandoned chateau where scientists were experimenting with clones and a gym. Gold/Silver occurs three years after the events of Red/Blue, at some point in those three years the volcano erupted and the town is no more. Everyone was evacuated on time luckily, but there's nothing in the island anymore.
Yeah I though it was strange that version was chosen
Honestly i hope this helps people see that "video game" music is real music. To hear about how a teacher taught a lesson on music theory about pokemon would literally be the most heart warming thing ever. These video game music composers are geniuses themselves too.
My favorite music is from bloodborne so yah I agree game music is real music.
If you want example look up Ludwigs theme
My favorite pokemon music trivia will forever be that one guy who made his entire 40 pages thesis on music theory about PMD music
Nintendo has one of the best video game music composed. Lets scrap that and make it Japanese. Some real composing geniuses are behind a lot of japanese developed games. Zelda, Metroid, final fantasy series all have amazing pieces.
@@siragon756 that’s not that uncommon. I knew someone in college who went on to write their 170 page phd thesis about their wow guild.
Scala radio in UK has a scheduled program called "The Console" hosted by Luci Holland 60mins of video game music, broadcast over the air each week. not sure if its available outside the UK
As a Pokemon fan I went 8/8 based purely on "does that feel like a Pokemon song?" 😂
Exactly 😂
Same!!!
I wouldn’t know Mozart if it bit me in the ass. So if I didn’t recognize it, it probably wasn’t Pokémon :P
Exactlyy
Same
A big tip of the hat to Junichi Masuda, the primary composer for the Pokemon franchise. I suspect he's a big Mozart fan given how similar the melody and song structures are when stripped down to their basic elements.
He was mostly just on battle theme duty after GSC. Go Ichinose, Hitomi Sato, Shota Kageyama and Minako Adachi all made most Pokemon music starting from RSE.
Zelda vs Tchaikovsky. Koji Kondo has been compared to Tchaikovsky's and other romantic composers "energetic" pieces, that would be fun :D
as soon as a piece in 13/16 came about (looking at you, final battle from OoT, you beautiful masterpiece) it would be a dead giveaway.
Koji Kondo has a very distinctive style that's immediately recognizable, so trying to make a video comparison with him in it would be a lot of fun, but probably incredibly easy.
The stalfos theme from Skyward Sword sounds just like Tchaikovsky, especially at 0:16 when it sounds exactly like Swan Lake.
th-cam.com/video/1ilC01aCgF4/w-d-xo.html
Awesome idea!
@@vixencaw7551 that wasn't composed by Kondo
@@papersonic9941 Oh you're right, my bad. It's actually by Mahito Yokota.
Pokémon music is actually incredible, over the 9 generations and their spin off games, it’s insane how much great music there has been
Well considering they gave 0 VA they kinda need it lmao.
Gen 9 has one of my new favorite OSTs for Pokémon. Area Zero and the final boss will never cease to give me goosebumps.
I love how no matter what people feel about the actual games, all pokemon fans agree the music slaps
I think one of my favorite pieces is the kanto/mewto battletheme in x and y. Also the song thats played by the kimono girls before the ho oh battle starts in heart gold. But there are so many good pokemon songs its incredible
Steven's theme from gen 3 has always been my favorite. So intense.
This challenge is so interesting. To clear this, you either have to be an extremely talented musician with a lot of knowledge of musical history, or just really good at a 24 year old game you played as a child. 😂
And I proudly fall in the latter
Hah. I wasn't sure whether to be proud that I got all of them right (except the bonus questions I had no idea about). lol
The intro song I knew from pokemon red and was like "I might be able to win this"
Actually, it's older than 25 years now. We just had the 25 year celebration.
@@ElysetheEevee miscalculation, my bad. I haven't played the original games in a while, I've mostly played RSE and upwards
For me there is slight rhythmic alterations between Mozart and Pokémon and a good understanding of Pokémon rhythm and some basic structures of Mozart. So yeah all that helped me get them all right
A lot of these were originally constructed with 8bit and 16bit sound’s making this all the more impressive
Hey, Nobuo Uematsu's been touring the world for 15 years with a full orchestra playing the music he wrote for Final Fantasy back in 1987.
@@cyanimation1605Uematsu is the greatest living composer
There are a lot of things to take into account when evaluating a composer's work and that is indeed one of them.
They were all limited in one way or another.
the gameboy is 4 bit.
@@GameyRaccoon It very clearly is indicated as being 8-bit, the CPU is a modified Sharp z80. It's sound chip has 4 sound channels: 2 square waves, 1 programmable wave and 1 noise generator.
This is awesome. The other day I heard Rite of Spring by Stravinsky and could have sworn it was from a Pokémon game, it’s general familiarity without putting my finger on where I knew it from. So there’s definitely classical roots in Masuda’s writing style that continued to influence music in Pokémon games he didn’t compose for.
Wikipedia cites classical music as well as Stravinsky as some of Masuda's major influences.
You probably already know but Rite of Spring can be clearly heard in the opening of One Winged Angel in ff7 so it definitely goes to show how groundbreaking it was and how important it still is. You wouldn't be surprised if someone told you it was from 100 years later. The same part is also the main melody of the Shark theme by John Williams of course
@@Ghost-xu3xs One Winged Angel is a tacky butchering of music, I wouldn't use that to demonstrate musical importance.
@@BloodrealmX I'm sorry but "tacky butchering of music" sounds a bit harsh for one of the most important and famous video game compositions ever.
And also even if you're convinced of that it doesn't change the fact that the opening of that piece is directly derived from the rite of Spring and even deaf people would recognise it, so there is musical importance and relevancy. (Btw I wasn't a big fan of One Winged Angel either until I heard it live in a theater and it blew the whole room away)
@@BloodrealmX it doesn't sound that great on a ps1 but a live orchestra makes the ps1 version sound like child's play. it's absurd hearing that song played live.
As someone with a Masters in conducting, and an AVID Pokemon fan from childhood... THIS VIDEO WAS AWESOME FOR SO MANY REASONS!
As someone who only took a music course in the eight grade. I also concur
For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life
As someone who took half a music course in the sixth grade, I also concur
As a pokemon master (whos caught all original 151) i can whole heartily agree
As A Casual Pokemon Fan Who's Caught All 1005 Pokemon. I Love This.
Well, I scored 100%. For me, Mozart melodies want to grow to become other things (deveolpment during the pice), while Pokemon, due to the nature of the looped music, tend to be repeatable. That Mozart symphony (number 5 question), for example, going from a minor context to a major relative.
Exactly.
I felt the same way. The Pokemon themes always seem to find, or approach, resolution. Mozart's pieces seem to be just getting started.
Yeah same
So you could say that Mozart's music.... evolves? Like a Pokemon? 😄
Mozart's music tends to have each phrase make a distinct statement, yet that statement is an unresolved part of a larger whole. Pokémon themes tend to not say as much, and yet resolve as if they weren't really going anywhere in the first place. I did get one wrong, but got 8/9 paying attention to this idea.
One consistent thing about Pokemon games has been the music, no matter how bad the games are or mediocre they are they just deliver with the music
I prefer the battle music over the pale impressions of Western classical/dance music.
hoenn music with the trumpet abuse is so fire
The music has actually been getting consistently better each gen
@@Greggortolimitations of the GBA
that's true
It seems easier for a pokémon fan to recognise music that doesn't sound like pokémon, than for a composer to recognise music that doesn't sound like Mozart.
I didn't recognise any of these songs (apart from Awakening/Heartwarming - though I didn't recognise it when it was simplified), but pokémon music seems to have a very distinctive sound.
Every generation in pokemon alone is pretty distinct music wise. Gen 3 was very trumpet heavy, gen 4 had piano, gen 8 had alot of rock music, etc.
Of course, mozart is a composer who made these pieces to match various styles while pokemon is just a series with a coherent style. I'm sure if you did Mozart vs all the works of Junichi Masuda (the composer for the pokemon games), it'd be more difficult.
Yeah, it was fascinating - I got all of them right as a Pokemon fan, but that included the Pikachu's Adventure theme, which I had never heard before. I figured it had to be from a game I hadn't played or just didn't know that well, because something about it sounded too Pokemon to me.
Makes sense. Mozart obviously is older than Pokémon so Pokémon's composers can be inspired by him and add their own elements.
It's easier to distinguish the added elements once you can recognise them than it is to distinguish the original from something it influenced.
@@lukedetering4490 In structure though, they all are very similar. If you play it all on the same instrument, without knowing which game it comes from, they'll sound very similar. (I guess not counting S+M onward)
I love the concept of this video, but as someone with trained ears who frequently transcribes Pokémon music for fun, it bugs me that a number of chord progressions in these simplified arrangements are incorrect lol. mm.7 of the bike theme should be a ii going to a V instead of being a V right away, the pedal point for the first four measures of St. Anne isn’t accurate, the V7 chord on m.1 beat 3 of Cinnabar should be a ii in second inversion, etc etc. Add to that the fact that Gen 1 Pokémon music has been rearranged and reharmonized several times at this point, even within official media, and you kind of have a mess haha.
When I tried to figure out where the St. Anne music came from, I ended up associating it to the Pokemon Sapphire Oceanic Museum, which is ironically also using the same theme, but slowed down and with more emphasis on the main melody. The various remixes in Fire Red almost remove the main melody entirely. It's fascinating how many remixes and alerations there are to some of the main melodies.
Trust me, the Mozart ones are as incorrect if not more, on one of the examples you can hear 3 g major chords 3 bars in a row, something Mozart would never have done in that way, and when you look at the original you can see that there is a D major on every third beat.
@@z.a.4801 Yes, this should have been pure melody instead of bad simplified arrangements. The chord progressions were simplified in a way that made almost all of them sound really unnatural. Weird voicings, weird bass notes, bad voice leading...
@@z.a.4801 I was really irritated that they omitted the leading note in one of the Mozart examples. That's the reason why they both felt it couldn't be Mozart and why they both looked uncomfortable on those chords. Makes the whole excercise pointless.
I’m glad there was Mystery Dungeon representation because the PMD series has such amazing music that the series is almost more known for its music than its gameplay
I play mystery dungeon music during homework
Mystery Dungeon is mostly known for its story
@@10meisterballe I said almost. It’s not an attack on the stories of the games, I think most of them are wonderfully written and much more complex than the main line games without being overly convoluted or watered down. They treat the kids that are their intended audience with the respect of assuming they’re actually intelligent. However, I was saying that the PMD music absolutely slaps. It’s some of the best video game music I’ve ever heard
@@jaredadkinson Also, gameplay and story are two separate elements, so you're right. Without the music and the story, it would be nothing more than a dungeon crawler.
PMD gang!
#5 was incredibly different. It didn’t feel classical, it felt like you were entering the climax of a Pokémon journey. Yet I couldn’t help but pick Mozart.
Same, I had played the game and yet it completely threw me off
just felt like something Mozart would do
#5 really wasn't arranged correctly. The original mozart had a B natural in the viola part and implied the harmony for the full 2nd measure is a G7, but the arrangement incorrectly assigned a Bb, completely changing the chord, harmonic sequence, etc, and it being a typo Bb was the entire basis for why one them even guessed Pokemon instead of Mozart
the tune at the start made me feel like it was pokemon; plus it felt like it could be played on loop so it just had to be
Originally I thought it had to be a Victory Road theme. But I switched my guess because I couldnt recall any Pokemon theme like it.
This is really fun, my strategy was seeing if it sounded like it could loop indefinitely because video game music doesn’t have a set beginning or end.
The original Cinnabar Island music is quite cheery. The reason the one in the vid is slower is because in the Red/Green/Blue/Yellow games, Cinnabar Island was a thriving touristy community with a Pokémon Gym. But between Red/Green/Blue/Yellow and Gold/Silver/Crystal, the settlement was destroyed by the island's volcano and the Cinnabar Gym Leader Blaine had to move his Gym to the nearby Seafoam Islands. The slower music in HeartGold and SoulSilver for Cinnabar Island reflects what happened to it. The only building present on the island is the Pokémon Center.
I love how cheery Pokémon music tends to be, it motivates you as you continue on your journey. So this Mozart vs Pokémon game was easy for me.
And then there's Gen 1 and FR/LG's lavender town theme
because you already know Pokémon songs duh
Fun fact:
ArticUNO
ZapDOS
MolTRES
And if we invert the order and dont count the last 4 letters, that forms MOZART
Pls pin me
@@PudimRebaixadocongrats, you figured out anagrams
@@PudimRebaixado "And if we invert the order and dont count the last 4 letters, that forms MOZART"
No, that forms MolZaArti. If you don't count the last FIVE letters, you get MoZArt, also known as one of the really common fan names for the fused Legendary Bird we see in the Pokemon Adventures manga. Also 1. don't beg for pins. It's cringey and self-important. 2. Pretty sure you can't pin a reply to a comment.
Yeah, Pokémon music is so mozartian. It's childlish, graceful, magical, funny and deeply melodical at the same time. I love both and this challenge was sort of easy for me lol. You could put every Mozart sonata on a PKMN game and it would fit there perfectly. I've enjoyed a lot this video.
The Poképark melody brought back so many memories, I was actually about to tear up a bit. It's such an underrated Pokémon game
I think what gives away some of the Pokémon ones are how the melody doesn’t start on the downbeat. Back on the gameboy, it could only play 4 pitches at once, so it usually played the bass note and start of an arpegiating chord on the downbeat, and then the melody came in on the next beat. It really forced the composers to write songs around the hardware at that time, so even when the track was remastered on more powerful hardware, it still had the same structure.
Thanks for the fact
Wow. I do remember that TH-cam channel 'Retro Game Mechanics Explained' touched on the audio capabilities of the original Game Boy in one of their videos, but I don't think they ever did a video specifically about what you mentioned.
That's some impressive trivia. Thanks.
True though pokemon has been on hardware that can do much more now, so those restrictions don't apply. Though I guess artists will be more inclined to keep the themes of their older work around.
@@Roboshi2007 Exactly. By the time the series got to that significantly better hardware, Pokémon music had developed a distinctive sound and it would've been weird for the fans if they'd heard something too different. It's really developed into something of a proto-genre by this point, same as a lot of the classic composers.
This was fun! Number 5 is an interesting one! I've been listening to Mozart for over 30 years and recognized the melody right away. The left hand part throws things off a little. Anyways, back to what makes this particular piece so interesting... It was neither originally composed by Mozart, nor was it a Pokemon tune. It was actually the andante of Carl Friedrich Abel's Symphony in B-Flat Major, Op.7. It was earlier misattributed to Mozart, because it was copied as a study piece by the young Mozart (then only 8 years old!) while he was visting London. A manuscript of the symphony written in his hand exsited and was categorized as his 3rd in the first complete published edition of his works. Mozart did change the score a little by replacing the oboe parts with clarinets and changing the key to E-Flat Major. I just thought I would share this interesting tidbit of info, because it illustrates the fact that even great composers start out by copying, studying and adapting the the works of established professionals. Everybody has to start somewhere! Mozart studied and assimilated the styles of prominent composers of his time, such as C.F. Abel, J.C. Bach, C.P.E. Bach and many others to eventually evolve into the masterful, influental composer we know today!
I very much appreciated learning about the history of this piece. Thank you
Fascinating stuff! Thank you for sharing.
Love this reply. Thanks for the cool information
Musical memory is amazing. Even though I haven’t played some of the Pokémon games on the list in years, my brain was still able to recognize them. The Pokepark one was especially surprising; I haven’t played that game since I was a small child, but my brain was STILL able to recognize the melody after all this time, even though I couldn’t remember which game I had heard it from. I got every one right just from the sheer strength of musical memory, since these games were really special to me growing up.
Same, I don't know where its from, I think it might be HGSS or Yellow, the PokePark version still good tho
I ended up getting all but the last one(and none of the bonus round) almost entirely off "I know Pokemon Music in my heart, if it does not resonate with that memory its probably the Mozart's genius instead"
This was interesting especially since I’m a composer who likes Pokémon. A lot of the game’s soundtrack was inspired by classical music which makes sense and I think it’s pretty cool
As a Japanese-American, I grew up listening to Japanese music as well as classical music and something about the Pokémon harmonies and melodies feel more Japanese while Mozart’s feel European.
To be specific, if I listened through the entire peace and felt like it had “flavor” I picked Pokémon, if it listened and went “Hm don’t really feel any flavor” I went with Mozart. I’m halfway through and have gotten everything right so far.
Edit: nvm I got one wrong
One of the ones they got wrong has a part that sounds like a South Korean pop song called Kiseki. So I thought that had to be Pokémon.
It’s the royal road chord progression
u talk mad tuff for somone with a furry pfp
@@yankeeshoota I- I was talking about music theory?????
Having listened to Pokemon music continuously from age six to now, it was easy to identify the Pokemon ones but it's really interesting to hear how they compare and contrast to Mozart
Also, the Cinnebar Island theme at 8:56 is a really unusual arrangement of that song. Most of the games that feature this song have a much faster melody. I'm assuming it was turned into this slow, music box theme to reflect how the island city had been destroyed in this sequel installment
Its the heartgold soul silver version actually
@@UmbraStarWolf no hgss is a remake of gold and silver which is the sequel instalment to red blue
@@EpicEric25 the cinnabar track used is from hgss
A lot of the timing on some of these transcriptions sound off to me. They don't sound correct even with a remix or alteration in mind. Some are just skip too slow or too fast to what they typically would be. I don't know. I wish my dad played Pokemon haha, I could ask him. I dropped learning more about music theory and reading music earlier on, while he's done it his entire life, even professionally.
@@UmbraStarWolf You're not disagreeing with the OP. HGSS is a remake of a sequel to the original series of Pokémon games. In the original the music is more upbeat, but in the second generation, a volcano decimated the island and left us with this dreary mood shift.
I love how I came into this from the exact opposite point of view as you. You kept looking into the music theory and seeing if it sounded like Mozart, meanwhile I was just listening to see if it sounded like Pokémon.
The Cinnabar Island theme has some interesting stuff going on that this quick game unfortunately couldn't accomodate. If you'll indulge me:
The simplified sheet music rendition is more similar to the theme in the original Pokémon Red and Blue versions, which is upbeat and uptempo. In the sequels Gold and Silver, the slower, melancholic rendition shown in the video plays. The reason for this change? In the time between when Red/Blue and Gold/Silver take place, the volcano atop the island erupted, destroying the small town that fans were returning to. That slow and quiet performance is a reflection of the player's sadness as they revisit a burned-down town from memories past.
What I find fascinating is that this quiz uses simplified piano versions of the tracks, and yet doesn't include a single Sinnoh track (the pokemon region most known for its excellent piano music).
Probably so we can't easily point out if it's a sinnoh song too easily
Sinnoh music is fantastic but sounds nothing like Mozart.
Cynthia's theme intensifies
It sounds more like jazz quartets in Sinnoh, may have been too easy . Such beautiful songs though and I'm definitely listening after this.
Ah, yes, the region known for great piano music, like the nighttime pokemon center theme, or the home town theme, or THE TRACK. We all know THE TRACK. It's our version of one winged angel. And we all learned the meaning of humility to it.
I'd love to see a poketuber and a music expert repeat this same challenge.
Poketuber would smoke the composer
I would like to see Jaden animations try to do this challenge I feel like that would be fun
I’d want the Pokétuber to also guess where the song is played LOL
Poketuber with a music degree be a good pick
Too easy for someone with hundreds of hours on Pokemon.
I haven't played one in almost a decade now, and I still got right most of them 😂
I think it was such a big missed opportunity to not include Cynthia's pre-battle music. So if you should decide to make another one of these, please have this one in it. And great video btw!
I have limited classical knowledge but I’m pretty sure Cynthia’s pre theme, while classical isn’t based on the style of Mozart particularly. They will know it right away.
Well that may be true but i still wanna see their reaction when they hear it :)
It's too much of a give away because it doesn't have similar elements to Mozart. It's too frenetic.
Cynthia's battle theme gives me Beethoven vibes. If you compare moonlight sonata 3rd movement to it, it's quite uncanny how much was inspired.
@@RadenWA i mean some of these others ones they are stumped on are pretty obviously not Mozart either haha. But yes they could do it again with a Romantic Era composer and it would be a better fit!
Why Pokémon game soundtrack sounds so similar to Mozart music scores is because the Pokémon composer, Junichi Masuda was inspired by a lot of movie and classical scores.
It blows my mind that people still refuse to believe video game music is at the same level as great musicians.
The amount of times I’ve shown somebody a song and had them react positively until I tell them it’s from a game and all of the sudden they hate it…
My husband and I snuck videogame music on our playlist for our wedding. A few of our friends figured it out but the family was clueless
This popped up in my recommended and I'm so glad it did, what a wonderful concept! If you wanted to expand this into a series, the music that Nobuo Uematsu did for Final Fantasy would be another great selection. Thank you for helping bridge the gap between classical listeners and video game fans, I strongly believe that video games have given us some of the most interesting and compelling contemporary classical music of the past three decades.
Honestly, just seeing them react to Dancing Mad would be good enough for me. Uematsu really just decided to give Kefka an entire four movement arrangement for his theme and I'm all for it.
as both a classical and video game fan, yes!!
@@TheNumber1Villain yes yes yes 👏
I’d like to hear their take on Xenoblade music
To be fair to you both, they picked some really good Pokémon songs that could be mixed up. There are some tracks that there would be 0 doubts
True but then what is the point. They also could have picked an excerpt from one of Mozart’s most famous pieces
I love their breakdowns because as soon as i hear a pokemon song im like yea it’s pokemon and pokemon gives it self away because i feel like it has a signature a feel to it that makes it distinct
Early 8-bit games could only have 3 voices sounding at any given time, so it almost forced the composers to use a more contrapuntal style to fill the most space possible
Isn't that what people call midi music?
@@JesusProtects Sort of. MIDI music is made by a computer and is basically code to tell the computer how to play the song. Like if the song was a script, to be read out and played. 8bit music basically is midi music but while only allowing a max of 4 voices: either 4 notes or 3 notes and a percussion layer (not much better sounding).
@@JesusProtects MIDI can have more voices.
This really shows how the instrument choice makes a huge difference and how good video game music is from simple melodies to complex compositions.
Great video!
I’d like to see “Is it classical or is it Metal” next
That would be too hard.
@@bobsala7780 Nah, that would be like the easiest challenge ever, unless it's specifically neo-classical metal. The melodic and harmonic vocabulary of classical are vastly different from metal.
@@MaggaraMarine it’s a joke
@@8722jojo Not sure. There are a lot of people who actually believe that metal is really close to classical.
Symphonic metal could actually give then a run for their money
1:05 I love how they’re deeply analyzing this and I’m just like “Pokemon boat song”
If you are a Pokémon fan, it's really easy to differentiate - they have a certain wistful, dreamy feel to them. 😊
I don't know - I got number 6 wrong (having not played Mystery Dungeon or any game where this theme appears obviously).
There were 2 or 3 notes in there that got me thinking "That does sound wrong for Pokemon", but then again, I do think that Pokemon may have had different composers over the years.
I only got the Pikachu park one wrong; I can see why this might be hard if you're not familiar with Pokemon, but there's a certain theme tying almost all of their music together if you're familiar with it.
@@james64ibm
Pokemon Mystery Dungeon was made by Hudsonsoft instead of Gamefreak, so it usually has a different vibe to its music. The final boss/level themes in particular are pretty distinct from most of the mainline games.
I don't play game with sound so I wasn't able to tell
Wasn't really surprised though lmao
@@james64ibm as a person who has a masters in music. 6 got me too. It sounded very Mozartian
I've heard several famous Mozart pieces, as well as a lot from main-series Pokemon, but most of the spin-off games are completely unfamiliar to me.
Out of the 8 pieces, the bike theme was the only one I recognized immediately, but I still got most of them right just by asking myself "could this be looped infinitely without driving the listener mad, or is it meant to go somewhere else after this?"
As someone who's never played Pokemon and has absolutely no experience with classical music, I was surprisingly good at this
The only Pokemon song I recognized was the bike theme but I was able to get them all right. If you play enough video games (maybe RPGs in particular?), even if you haven't played a lot of Pokemon, you can kinda get a feel for what what environmental themes sound like. They usually don't have much build up and instead quickly establish the mood of the area
@@EmperorZ19 Same experience as you! I found it really interesting how despite me having no music theory knowledge at all and them having a deep technical intellectual discussion incorporating music theory, I was able to be more successful at identifying which composition belonged to which category with 100% accuracy. I don’t even listen to Mozart and based my judgements purely on whether or not it matched that environmental Pokemon video-game aesthetic. I wonder if despite their music theory knowledge, they’re just lacking in enough exposure to Mozart or video game music or a combination of both. 😅 It’s really amazing how the patterns and feelings that music evokes can run much deeper than it’s surface gradeable, intellectual, and mathematical merits.
It's a 50/50 choice tho, anyone can do "surprisingly good" while having no idea about this.
@@lashs5311 True. But, it’s not particularly easy to flip 7 heads in a row. Give it a try. 😆
@@DeletedChannel379 It's 8 songs, if you randomly guess on average you should get 4 out of 8. So yeah, if you hit 7 out of 8 that was quite impressive.
The fact that there even is a challenge to differenciate the music of mozart from the Pokemon themes speaks for itself. The creators of the Pokemon themes are the real underappreciated heroes (Gen V especially :D)
FR/LG version of Gen2 johto route, Sevii islands theme, is one of the best but you might not know this one gen well
Anyone else really craving some chip-tune Mozart rn?
This was something I didn’t realize I needed until you specifically said it
I'm going to Google search that now
Edit: okay this one slaps. th-cam.com/video/EttYkXS0KCc/w-d-xo.html
Searched up 8-bit mozart rn and they are bangers
I feel like SiIvaGunner has to have some Pokemon rips with that premise
@@Sebb_Music he has a REALLY good Turkish march remix that’s remixed off of attack of the killer queen from deltarune. I listen to it regularly, it’s so good
I think this is much easier for a pokemon fan than it is for a classical music nerd
Mozart's repertoire is too large for anyone other than a dedicated scholar to have heard all his songs. Meanwhile you listen to every track while playing the game. So this video is essentially obscure Mozart comps vs common Pokemon songs
@@ApathyBM eh the mystery dungeon & pokepark songs are pretty obscure as far as the whole series goes, the first few pokemon songs though definitely are pretty common
@@ApathyBM there is like 5hours of Ost for pmd alone I think there is a lot of obscure pokemon jinggles there are like 30 pokemon games. But its impressive how many nice little melodies the pokemon games have, one of the things game freak somehow held up the quality off
Not unless you have played every game of every gens. I stopped at Gen 3, I couldn't recognize all of the tracks.
@@marugochan131 man you should play at least heart gold/soul silver. They are the perfect remake and better then the originals in every aspect.
The thumbnail definitely got me to click, and the incredible content got me to stay. Thanks for the fun watch! It helps a ton that you don’t know too many Pokémon songs
Really appreciate the historically informed recordings! 😊
Next you should try Castlevania vs Baroque composers! Some pieces like the Wood Carving Partita from Symphony of the Night could easily pass.
It's gonna be easier because they don't have Bach or Handel works written when they were five years old (or written by someone else, like the Symphony #3 which wasn't actually written by Mozart). It wouldn't be as easy to confuse any of the adult compositions of those composers.
I love video game soundtracks; they’re catchy but more dramatic than standard pop music. It warms my heart when video game music gets some serious attention (like at the Tokyo Olympics when I recognized Robo’s theme from Chrono Trigger).
i recognized proof of a hero from the monster hunter saga. its a song that really gives you the vibe of being the last standing in front of adversity, and being able to surpass it
Cool video, I got them all right. Funny Mark's strategy seems to be associating things Mozart would do while mine was the opposite, I kept associating them to Pokémon. Guess that happens when you love Pokémon like I do.
Yea we realized that we were relying heavily on harmony and voice-leading which kind of missed the point! If we do another one of these we will strip it down to just the melody
@@RyanLeach I really wish they’d included “Approaching Champion Cynthia”, although I guess that sounds more Romantic than Mozart
Edit: Volo’s battle music includes the same theme
Note that the Cinnabar island one isn't always that slow. In Pokemon Gold & Silver it is, because the majority of the island was destroyed by a volcano eruption.
In Pokemon Red/Blue/Yellow it's about the same speed as the example piece: th-cam.com/video/VBby1E3tWwo/w-d-xo.html
I'm proud to say that I understood more than 22% of the terms and phrases in this video.
2/9ths? Well done!
This was fun! I got all the pokemon questions right too, mostly because I recognize way too many pokemon melodies haha
same here :)
I have heard it said that all modern-day music is based on Bach; in that it is derived from someone, who derived it from someone, who derived it from someone, who derived it from Bach.
Makes me wonder if maybe "Bach or Pokemon" would be even harder to tell apart.
Funny you say that… I had a theory teacher in college who said if you think you’ve heard something new, Bach already did it somewhere in his work
A lot of the melodies in the video sounded like something from The Golberg Variations to me.
I don't know anything about music but I'd still bet money that somebody somewhere is singing something that can be traced back to traditional folk music written by people who never had the capacity to ever hear anything that could be traced to Bach.
Great to see you closing in on 100k subscribers! Well deserved 😊
Thanks David! If you want to join me for “Is it Beethoven or Dragon Quest” I’d love to have you on!
@@RyanLeach haha! I’d love to get involved, although I’m not familiar with dragonquest so that idea may not work as well. Perhaps have a think about any other formats you can think of and send me a message to my email 😃 I’d love to collab 😀
Could you both do an episode on temperament? It could be fantastic to introduce people how temperament changes things- equal temperament was only introduced in 1917 AD. The unequal temperaments are so much fun - every key has its’s own character!
I'd love to watch Mozart take this quiz.
He'd probably be annoyed at how bad the piano transcriptions are. And so would Masuda for that matter ;)
Get ze ouija board
He has an unfair advantage though
Sure I’ll go dig him for you
@@pjkorab both of them had wrong transcription, that makes it fair!
The Cinnabar Island theme from Red/Green would have been a more accurate reflection of the simplified version you played because the Heart Gold/Soul Silver rendition is used for a completely destroyed Cinnabar Island after a volcano eruption so it's meant to be a little somber.
Great concept! Too bad some of the chords for some of the pokemon themes were off and that gave it away on more than one occasion.
A bit advantaged here since I listened to a lot of classical music growing up and am pretty familiar with Pokemon music in general, even without knowing the exact songs, there are pretty distinct telltales signs from classical music of Mozart's era that make it different from Pokemon music that I can't quite put into words. I would say only #7 was difficult.
Its fascinating to hear how similar some of the pokemon tracks could have been classical pieces back in the day
with all dem parallel fifths?
I love Pokémon's music but I can guarantee you the audience at the time would hate it
@@Plasmariel Tell me the SS Anne theme wouldn't have fit as opening ambience to a summer time part at a villa in France. Add in some violins, some piano, and some flutes and you got a 18th century banger.
@@BrandonsUsername pretty sure it doesn't follow the typical cadence formulas, but it is a good theme
@@BrandonsUsername The SS Anne theme wouldn't have fit as opening ambience to a summer time pary at a villa in France. Not even close. It's a rambling directionless melody, which I suppose was the intention for a Pokemon theme but is completely unlike the well-structured pieces being written by trained composers of the late 18th Century.
Mozémon or Pokézart? This is such a dope video.
It was a good observation that not all notes of the melody are retained in these simplified arrangements. I'm a fan of Pokemon, and when I heard the Bike theme I noticed the last stanza was cut, and it caused the sample to end somewhat akwardly.
12:30 "You can't just sit on a note"
La Monte Young: "Hold my pencil..."
A strategy you could try to use is to try looping the track. Pokémon and game music in general is typically designed to loop on itself and still sound good
yeah a lot who got them all right did just this
think "can this loop and stull be good?" XD
It's fun and makes me wonder how many game music have gotten their style from which specific classical composers.
I think traditionally a lot of game composers, especially in Japan have classical educations as something engraved in the culture. It shows through j-pop as well in the way they handle modulations and chord progressions overall. A joy to listen to and utterly fascinating to study/emulate.
@@BrianMagnan Yeah, Japan is quite likely the only (Eastern) Asian country that embraces Western culture earliest and most (say, starting mostly from the Meiji Reform). Even outside of the gaming industry and J-Pop the Western music influences in Japan can be well observed.
Most japanese video game composers studied at classical conservatories
considering that classical is a sort of starying point to learning music. we can assume that game, anime and even modern pop composers study them at some point.
so it should not be much of a surprise if their music uses classic music as a foundation of sorts.
Something tells me Mozart would have been a huge gaming nerd.
"So basically, with videogames I can have access to an enormous variety of great music and at the same time there are characters performing a play for me and only for me, and it is also interactive??? Whoever made this, give them a medal or something ".
I mean yeah most of the people I know who are music nerds also love video games, myself included.
From what I’ve heard about him he would’ve been a massive troll and shitposter.
mozart used to roleplay as a cat
@@notting2640 iirc, he wrote erotic letters involving scat to his cousin. So definitely would have been 4chan user
@@inklovemail He would love Mystery Dungeon then!
I really love the existence of this video
I'm an avid player of Pokemon but I also have musical education up to the high school level. I got everything right and am super proud of myself! I really like it when game music has strong classical influences! :)
This is cursed. I love it. Makes you really realize how hard the devs on Gamefreaks work with their musical construction :D 10/10 !
Especially in gen 1
🤡
Great video and a great quiz! If I didn't already know the tracks from Pokémon, this would've been slightly harder. My only issue with the quiz itself is that Symphony No. 3 K.18 was not by mozart, but Abel.
What a great idea for a quiz! I wanted to play along fairly so badly, but I immediately recognize any Pokemon music from the first chord xD
This was so creative and entertaining !! Really well made it was fun to play along
I feel like these guys would've nailed everything if the arrangements weren't simplified.
Being somewhat of a pokemon nerd *and* a music nerd, this was a super fun watch
Wonderful video concept and it really makes you realize how talented the Pokémon composers are
The difference is clear if you see the entire scores. In this video only short segments are analyzed.
If you listen to the entire melodies, it's clear that the ones of Mozart are more elaborated. In the soundtracks of Pokemon you basically find basic/static themes, while in the melodies of Mozart there is an extensive development.
Were. The composers now aren’t the same.
@@Wyllowisp I don’t think vgm composers are a good indicator of composers at large :P there’s still plenty of good stuff around and being made
@@june9914 In a forum of classical music in which I write, someone thinks that the best music of the 21st and 20th centuries has been composed by the soundtrack composers and not by the classical music composers.
Nice! I got 7/8 before the bonus round, only missed the first one. Super cool video idea and a fun little challenge to play along with.