The most famous game tune in the world is now being preserved in an important library for the first time.
Baadabaadababa baa. Well, that might not be enough to put a worm in your ear. But you’ve read the headline and you probably know which song it’s about! It’s of course the iconic main or ground theme from the very first Super Mario Bros. for the NES. Some people can’t get the melody out of their heads anyway since it set records in the cinema.
It’s not without reason the most famous sequence of sounds that a video game has ever produced. Probably deletes that. Because now, at the latest, this piece will be honored with an entry in the US Library of Congress and thus preserved for posterity. This has never been granted to any other piece of music from a video game.
And if you want to listen spontaneously right now:
link to YouTube content
Koji Kondo alongside Madonna and John Lennon
The Library of Congress is considered to be one of the largest libraries in the world, beaten only by the British Library in London when it comes to media holdings. But recently she has grown a little and, like every year, has recorded a whole series of other pieces of music by famous artists.
These include Like a Virgin by Madonna, Imagine by John Lennon and uh, Concerto for Clarinet and Chamber Orchestra by the Northwest Chamber Orchestra and composer Ellen Taaffe Zwilich
also the Mario Theme by its composer Koji Kondo. A name that, measured by the popularity of the melody, has probably completely faded away. Wrongly! In the Library of Congress press release it says:
Few musicians have created works that have garnered as much attention internationally and have remained relatively unknown themselves as Koji Kondo, the man who composed the music for the Super Mario Bos. composed video games in the 1980s.
Koji Kondo also has his say in the message and talks about how music for video games came about in the 80s and what the challenge was. At the same time, the composer is very honored:
To have this music preserved alongside so many classical songs is truly a great honour. It’s actually a little hard to believe.
– Which Kondo
What famous music tracks from video games should also be honored in this way? The Tetris theme? The Halo Anthem? Wii Sports menu music? Surely one or the other of you will listen to the sounds of Monkey Island for hours or listen melancholically to GLaDOS Still Alive singing. Write us your suggestions in the comments!
