Dream Compositions

As we’ve explained before in our comprehensive Beta Guide, Banjo-Kazooie went through a lot of interesting changes before it wound up looking and even sounding like the classic adventure that stands before us today. Before we could even begin collecting large golden jigsaw pieces or stuffing birds unorthodoxly into backpacks, Rare was hard at work on a game called Dream which featured a boy named Edison who soon finds himself tangled up with a gang of pirates lead by Captain Blackeye. As Banjo-Kazooies’ development continued, so did Dream, and eventually the seafaring scenario was left on the cutting room floor as Dream was destined to become the game we know and love.
During this development stage Grant Kirkhope, Audio Director and Composer for Banjo-Kazooie, was creating tunes for use within Dream that would ultimately end up being abandoned once the switch over occurred as the RPG-style music no longer suited Banjo’s repertoire. However, unlike Dream, these songs were not scrapped and thrown away, but have instead found their way online after Grant thoughtfully uploaded a number of compositions exclusive to Dream!

In similar respect to levels from Beta Banjo-Kazooie that were nixed and found reincarnation elsewhere in other games, the same can be said about the music from Dream which has sprung up in a number of Rare titles including Banjo-Tooie, Donkey Kong 64, Viva Pinata and even Banjo-Kazooie: Nut’s and Bolts.

Grant’s taken the liberty of detailing his experiences while working on Dream on his site, and it goes without saying that the entire article is worth checking out!

Below we’ve included each of the compositions, as well as the accompanying description from Grant Kirkhope. If the song has been heard elsewhere in Grants’ lineage during Rare then you’ll notice we’ve included some context as to where you might have heard it, as well as what time the cue can be heard during the song. Though these “Memorable Melodies” will be repeated throughout the piece, this will allow you to pinpoint the exact second it comes into the tune.


Dream Main Theme

This piece took a long time to write. Tim Stamper was looking for a big main theme to have for the opening of the game and I wrote several pieces that he liked (or so he said!) but didn’t feel captured the feeling of the game. I wanted to have a seafaring feel for the pirate element of the game and a grand sounding noble theme at the same time, and Tim wanted “Big Drums”…hehe! I remember I was in the shower thinking about this tune, I had the opening sea sounding section but no main theme after it, I was humming away and the first little section of the melody just came to me. I dashed to Rare still trying to hum it and managed to get it into Cubase before I forgot it. This tune eventually turned up in” Viva Pinata”, I wanted to save it until I had a game that I felt it suited and I was really happy when I realise it would fit into VP. The way the orchestra played it for VP was fantastic, just as I imagined it sounding all those years ago.

listen here

Memorable Melodies:

0:01 – 4:42: Day 11Viva Pinata.
0:01 – 4:42: Oven-Fresh DayViva Pinata: Trouble in Paradise.


Blackeye

Blackeye was of course the “baddie” in “Dream”. He had a pirate ship called “The Mudplugger”, I think I would’ve imagined it to be like “The Black Pearl” from “The Pirates of the Caribbean” films. I wanted to make him a little dark but also have some humour in there, so you can hear a bit of a shanty going on in the middle section of the piece. Also I wanted to get across the idea that he thought of himself as grand and honourable even though he was far from it! I actually wrote a song for him to sing, it was sung by one of the artists at Rare, who could manage a good pirates accent, and I had a pirates chorus that consisted of some of the team, I have to say we thought it was hilarious……..sadly I don’t seem to be able to find it anywhere, I’m hoping I’ll be able to track it down, I’d love to put it up here for you all to have a listen too!

listen here

Memorable Melodies:

0:03 – 0:06: Gloomy GalleonDonkey Kong 64.
0:34 – 0:38: Freezeezy PeakBanjo-Kazooie.


Chase

There’s another tune in here that went on to appear somewhere else! This was going to be a chase sequence between some trolls and the hero in mine carts (similar to the mine cart chase in “Indiana Jones 2”) I think. When I wrote the piece I was imagining the camera switching between the hero and the trolls and back so I tried to mix both themes together. You can hear the theme that eventually ended up in “Viva Pinata” as the hero’s theme and the “Mad Monster Mansion” theme again for the trolls. I remember thinking this was going to be really hard to pull off but it all came together quite easily. I really like this piece, brings back alot of memories.

listen here

Memorable Melodies:

0:03 – 0:08: Mad Monster MansionBanjo-Kazooie.
0:00 – 0:14: Time Flies (Day 2)Viva Pinata.
0:00 – 0:14: Day 10Viva Pinata.
0:01 – 0:14: Frosty MorningViva Pinata: Trouble in Paradise.
0:14 – 0:17: BanjoLandBanjo-Kazooie: Nuts and Bolts.
0:17 – 0:22: Nutty Acres (Day)Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts and Bolts.
0:51 – 1:03: Nutty Acres (Night)Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts and Bolts.
0:51 – 1:03: Witchy WorldBanjo-Tooie.
0:51 – 1:20: Nutty Acres Jiggy ChallengeBanjo-Kazooie: Nut’s and Bolts.


Shanty

This was the first piece that I wrote for “Dream”, there wasn’t any area of the game for it to go but I just wanted to get started and thought of a beach scene. I really like this piece, there’s something calming about it and you can hear how I was using much more traditional chord sequences than I eventually did when it changed to Banjo-Kazooie. I always think of Robinson Crusoe when I hear this piece……don’t know why……Ah the good old days!

listen here

Memorable Melodies:

0:58 – 1:19: Tootys ThemeBanjo-Kazooie.


Troll

Hmmmmm…..I really can’t think of much to say about this one, I’m not even sure if this is the right title, I was either Trolls our Elves. As you can hear they weren’t really really bad, I was trying to make them more mischievous I think.

listen here

Memorable Melodies:

0:01 – 0:34: Snackers ThemeBanjo-Kazooie.
0:35 – 0:41: Rusty Bucket BayBanjo-Kazooie.


Bully

This tune is interesting (well I think so anyway!) as it eventually ended up as the “Mad Monster Mansion” theme. I remember tryng to think of a way to use dark chords and still make it light and humourous, I was listening to “Beetlejuice” quite alot at the time and I liked the style of the music that Mr.Elfman used in the movie. So I started playing with the “oompah” style, that ended being one of the signature styles in the Banjo games, and this tune was born. I really can’t quite remember what the character of “Bully” was like, I seem to remember he was like the Troll guarding the bridge in the story of “Billy Goat’s Gruff” but I could be totally wrong!

listen here

Memorable Melodies:

0:06 – 2:37: Mad Monster MansionBanjo-Kazooie.
0:06 – 0:20: Terrarium of TerrorBanjo-Kazooie: Nut’s and Bolts.
0:06 – 1:08: Banjo LandBanjo-Kazooie: Nut’s and Bolts.


Big Belly

I had a lot of fun writing this one as I think you’ll hear!! This character was a big fat drunken Pirate that liked to eat and drink way too much. I don’t think we ever got to the stage of having an actual model to look at so he remained in our imaginations coupled with this tune to bring him to life …….well…..nearly! I remember I wrote the tune and then Greg(Mayles) suggested adding a few “effects”, so of course I went overboard and added lots of stuff. Hearing this tune after all these years really makes me smile and reminds me of the fun we had dreaming up this stuff. I was really new at Rare and didn’t know what to expect, and I was even newer to the team so I was really just finding my way. We all shared the same sense of humour and I think you can tell that when you play the Banjo games, the graphics match the sound match the humour!

listen here

0:03 – 0:05: Captain Blackeye DrinkingBanjo-Tooie.
0:11 – 0:12: Klumps’ Orange BurpDonkey Kong 64.
0:13 – 0:14: Loggo’s Voice MumbleBanjo Kazooie.
0:23 – 0:27: Jameleon Romance DanceViva Pinata
0:23 – 0:40: Bottles’ HouseBanjo-Tooie
1:19 – 1:20: Fart Inside Loggo’s TankBanjo-Kazooie.


Madeleine

Madeleine was the hero’s (Edsun) girlfriend and I tried to write something that was light with a strong theme. This piece actually turned up briefly in Banjo-Kazooie as Tootie’s theme. You hear it in the intro movie as she skips through the grass, it’s only a small snippet but this is where it came from. Tim Stamper wanted to call all the characters in Banjo-Kazooie after instruments hence Banjo and Kazooie, Tootie was originally going to be called Piccolo so I thought the flute playing the main theme would suit her. I can’t remember why we abandoned that naming convention, maybe there just wasn’t enough instruments!

listen here

Memorable Melodies:

0:01 – 0:50: Tooty’s ThemeBanjo-Kazooie.


Voyage

As the title implies this was a seafaring piece meant for when you transversed the map screen in the game, it was going to be a bit like Indiana Jones with an arrow and trail taking you on to the next area. I don’t think we ever got as far as actually having the map screen in the game, a lot of the stuff I did for “Dream” was all in my imagination as I was working super quick being so excited just to be at Rare. I had a sheet of locations and I just started at the top and worked my way through.

listen here

0:01 – 3:33: Midnight Feasts (Night 2)Viva Pinata.


Cockeye

This character was a good pirate and a bit of a mad professor so I tried to work in a bit of a noble theme sprinkled with some oddball bits to imply his madness! I don’t think we ever got to an in-game character but there was concept art around for him. I added in a slightly pompus middle section for him and I was thinking of “Crown Imperial” by Walton, I thought it gave him that “stiff upper lip” kind of character…….bowler hats and umbrellas with a handlbar moustache!

listen here

0:01 – 0:03: Showdown TownBanjo-Kazooie: Nuts and Bolts.
0:10 – 0:14: HAG 1 BattleBanjo-Tooie.
0:46 – 0:48: DK IsleDonkey Kong 64.


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