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Old Jul 5, 2016, 06:53 PM
Spirit_Chaser Spirit_Chaser is offline
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Join Date: Jan 2014
Posts: 231
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I forgot about this thread for a while. I've been doing my own research and investigating lately, mostly of the members of Falcom Sound Team J.D.K. from the 90's. In partucular, the composers that were involved with Brandish 2 plus Satoshi Arai. They would leave one by one until the last remaining member Atsushi Shirakawa left after Vantage Master Japan.

I've been doing my best to track down Atsushi Shirakawa, Mieko Ishikawa, Naoki Kaneda, Takahiro Tsunashima, Masaru Nakajima, Hirofumi Matsuoka and Satoshi Arai. I've gotten a lot of information so far.

Atsushi Shirakawa: Goes by Tenmon now. A powerhouse of a composer. Besides his sheer amount of composition for video game music, he has written a lot of music for his original works and anime. He is still active today and can be reached through his Twitter. He actually responds, so I have been able to get composer credits for many of his games while he was in Falcom. Sometimes it's a full breakdown, sometimes he is not sure on a track, sometimes he doesn't remember the majority of it, but I've gotten many composition credits from him for The Legend of Xanadu, The Legend of Xanadu II, Ys V, The Legend of Heroes IV, Zwei!! and soon Brandish 3.

Naoki Kaneda: Known as Kim's Soundroom now. After getting his composition credits, I can say he is an incredible composer with a lot of talent now that we know almost every song that was him under Falcom. He can be easily reached through his Twitter. After Falcom he continues to work on music. I asked him the other day about what he is doing now and he said he is currently working on songs for more than one game. I've managed to get composer credits from him for The Legend of Xanadu, The Legend of Xanadu II, Ys V, and The Legend of Heroes IV, and Brandish 3.

Hirofumi Matsuoka: The first one of this group confirmed to have passed away. After getting composer credits from Atsushi Shirakawa and Naoki Kaneda, I don't think Matsuoka composed much during his early games with Falcom (maybe just sound program). He does have a Twitter, but I took too long to reach him and was unable to ask him anything due to him passing away from stomach cancer. He did start a solo project with a vocalist after leaving Falcom and you can check out "Fermata" to hear what he sounds like on his own.

Mieko Ishikawa: Another great composer that has fallen under Yuzo Koshiro's shadow. Getting a hold her seems impossible and I have no leads besides her currently being one of Falcom's directors. I don't have any composer credits for her during Brandish 2 and so on, but I can make decent guesses based on her work before that where it is easier to tell what she composed.

Masaru Nakajima: The trail for this composer went cold. He did continue to write music after leaving Falcom for the FMPSG organizartion, and released an original work titled "White Swan" (good luck trying to find that because I still haven't and there isn't even an entry for it here). I Asked both Atsushi Shirakawa and Naoki Kaneda if they knew how I could contact him or whatever happened to him, but neither of them know. I also tried contacting every current member of FMPSG but they either didn't respond or didn't know either. Not even his email works anymore and his websites shut down.

Takahiro Tsunashima: He continued for Gruppo One as a composer after leaving Falcom. After that, the trail gets cold. I asked Naoki Kaneda if he knew what happened to him or if there was a way to get a hold of him, but he doesn't know what happened to him.

Satoshi Arai: I have nothing on him at the moment.
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