One of the things I love about Final Fantasy is the music. Ever since I heard the opening of the OG FFVII, it just gives me goosebumps. There are so many iconic songs from each game, playful tunes like the Chocobo theme, or battle music like One Winged Angel which will get your blood pumping.

I think we all heard from our parents that video games are useless and don't give any value, and it makes me wonder how many of them listened to the soundtrack? I was babysitting for my friend (kid loved me as I was the only "nanny" to play games with him) who studied classical music. She knew nothing about games, yet she heard about Final Fantasy, because it was mentioned at their class as one of the best pieces of classical music of our time.

If you know Final Fantasy and its music, you also know Nobuo Uematsu. One Winged Angel is still one of my favourites from his works and I had the chance to hear it live in 2019 at the Royal Albert Hall. Video is not mine, courtesy of Youtube:

Distant Worlds is a concert series dedicated to Final Fantasy music played by local orchestras around the world. Most of the shows will feature music from all Final Fantasy games, but there will be also special ones focusing on certain games, like the one happening this weekend in London for Final Fantasy VII Rebirth. If we ask nicely, TheGreatestBanana12 will share his review and experience.

Uematsu-san has retired from making music, and apart from some special appearances and compositions he's not actively taking part in composing for the franchise, but I think we have a worthy successor in Masayoshi Soken, who created breath-taking music for FFXIV and FFXVI. After fighting the site crashes at Eventim today I managed to buy tickets for the FFXIVxFFXVI edition of Distant Worlds next year, and you better believe I'm already counting the days back to hear this song live:

Next week I'm planning to talk about the end of FFXIV 1.0 and I will mention there my other favourite piece from Uematsu-san, but now let me show you another song from Soken-san and share the story behind it. You might want to grab some tissues now.

As we learnt it from Soken-san's speech at the end of the digital Fan Fest held during the lockdowns, he wrote this song from his hospital bed while he was receiving treatment for cancer. First the team wanted to delay the patch which featured this fight as they wanted him to focus on recovery and not work, but he begged them to let him work, so Square Enix CEO organised for a workstation to be setup in his room. This song hits hard with the story of the character as it is, but if you listen to the lyrics again knowing the story behind its composition it hits even harder. It is the song I listen to whenever I feel like I need strength to carry on. This fight also features one of the hardest Active Time Maneuverers in the game (ATM is when you have to smash some buttons fast enough against a timer)

Anyone who says that video games are silly and don't give us any value, I would make them listen to this song and this speech which had an the entire development team on stage and millions of fans at home in tears:

And to share my favourite from FFXVI as well, here is Find the Flame which instantly made it to my games music playlist with powerful battle themes:

According to what they told us at the Distant Worlds concert in 2019 there are two songs which must be played at each concert as per Uematsu-san's request. One of them is One Winged Angel. Can you guess which might be the other one?

What are your favourite songs from Final Fantasy? Feel free to share them below!