Unlimited Replays: Video Games and Classical Music

by William Gibbons

Overview

Classical music is everywhere in video games. Works by composers like Bach and Mozart fill the soundtracks of games ranging from arcade classics, to indie titles, to major franchises like BioShock, Civilization, and Fallout. Children can learn about classical works and their histories from interactive iPad games. World-renowned classical orchestras frequently perform concerts of game music to sold-out audiences. But what do such combinations of art and entertainment reveal about the cultural value we place on these media? Can classical music ever be video game music, and can game music ever be classical? Delving into the shifting and often contradictory cultural definitions that emerge when classical music meets video games, Unlimited Replays offers a new perspective on the possibilities and challenges of trying to distinguish between art and pop culture in contemporary society.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780190265281
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	04/02/2018
Series:	Oxford Music/Media Series
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	320
Sales rank:	818,495
File size:	5 MB

About the Author

William Gibbons is Associate Professor of Musicology at Texas Christian University, where he is also Associate Dean of the College of Fine Arts. He is the author of Building the Operatic Museum: Eighteenth-Century Opera and Fin-de-siècle Paris and co-editor of Music in Video Games: Studying Play.

Table of Contents

Introduction: Press Start to Replay Chapter 1: Terms and Conditions Chapter 2: Playing with Music History Chapter 3: A Requiem for Schrödinger's Cat Chapter 4: Allusions of Grandeur Chapter 5: A Clockwork Homage Chapter 6: Remixed Metaphors Chapter 7: Love in Many Monstrous Forms Chapter 8: Violent Offenders and Violin Defenders Chapter 9: Playing Chopin Chapter 10: Gamifying Classical Music Chapter 11: Classifying Game Music Conclusion

Editorial Reviews

"Unlimited Replays occupies a significant place in game music scholarship. It is the first book devoted to ever-intriguing instances of classical music in video games, and through addressing that topic, it seeks to build a bridge from ludomusicology toward more longstanding fields of enquiry ... an accessible, thoughtful, and thought-provoking work on a topic of interest across academic disciplines, and beyond — classical-music concert programmers and critics might find much to consider here in regard to the music's future, for instance. Indeed, the book could be recommended to almost anybody with an interest in its topic." — Jonathan Godsall, Journal of Sound and Music in Games

"From Chopin and Mussorgsky to Bioshock and Fallout, Gibbons delivers a wondrous opus of sharp analyses into the intersections between classical music and video game cultures. A rewarding read for concert-goers and gamers alike." — William Cheng, Assistant Professor of Music, Dartmouth College, and author of Sound Play: Video Games and the Musical Imagination

"Instead of weaponizing classical music (and so-called serious culture) against video games, or vice versa, Gibbons's thoughtful and important book shows how classical music can be deployed to tease out rich readings of video games where it appears as well as testifying to the ongoing resilience and relevance of classical music." — Neil Lerner, Professor of Music, Davidson College

From the Publisher