Nintendo Soundtracks on CD and Vinyl: A Guide to Zelda, Mario, and the Famicom Era

Nintendo is not a composer, it is the credit line on the sleeve, and that credit covers one of the steadiest in-house music departments in any medium. Hirokazu Tanaka arrived in 1980 and spent nineteen years writing music and designing the hardware that played it, including the Famicom and Game Boy sound chips. Koji Kondo followed in 1984, the first person Nintendo hired specifically to compose, and his 1985 overworld theme for Super Mario Bros. taught a generation what a melody was.

The Family Computer reached Japan in July 1983 with a handful of sound channels and no way to play back recorded audio, and the staff treated that as a brief rather than a limit. What makes the catalog worth shelving is that Nintendo kept releasing it properly: Nippon Columbia has run the official soundtrack program in Japan for decades, issuing anniversary sets, complete multi-disc scores, and orchestral concert recordings with real booklets and credits. Those are the Nintendo-billed titles on our shelf, all Japanese imports.

That changed recently, when Nintendo and Laced Records brought Breath of the Wild to vinyl. Seven records follow: six Nintendo-credited CDs running from the Famicom era to Hyrule's open world, plus that box set. The house style is documentary rather than highlights.

Nintendo - Nintendo Famicom Music CD

Nippon Columbia issued Nintendo Famicom Music in November 2013 for the console's thirtieth anniversary, and it is that rare game music release assembled by pulling audio straight from the original software. The ROM cassette half runs through Donkey Kong, Balloon Fight, Mario Bros., Wrecking Crew, Ice Climber, Mach Rider, and the first and third Super Mario Bros. The Disk System half covers The Legend of Zelda, Zelda II, Metroid, Kid Icarus, and the Disk System startup music itself.

Why it's worth purchasing

• The cleanest single-disc survey of the Famicom sound chip, taken from the games themselves
• Puts Tanaka's Metroid and Kid Icarus beside Kondo's Mario themes in one sitting
• Includes the Disk System startup music, a piece everybody heard and nobody owned

Nintendo - 30th Anniversary Super Mario Bros. Music CD

Nippon Columbia's 30th Anniversary Super Mario Bros. Music is a two-disc set covering seventeen titles, from Super Mario Bros. in 1985 through Super Mario 3D World in 2013, with bonus material from Super Mario Maker. It takes in both Super Mario Land handhelds, Super Mario World, Super Mario 64, Sunshine, the New Super Mario Bros. line, and both Galaxy games. Hearing Kondo's eight-bit originals beside later orchestral arrangements of the same themes is a lesson in writing music built to survive new hardware.

Why it's worth purchasing

• Two discs tracing a few melodic ideas across three decades of hardware
• Covers the Game Boy and Nintendo 64 entries shorter Mario compilations skip
• The Super Mario Maker bonus tracks close it with the series on itself

Nintendo - 30th Anniversary The Legend of Zelda Game Music Collection CD

The Legend of Zelda arrived on the Famicom Disk System on February 21, 1986, and this anniversary collection followed from Nippon Columbia on September 28, 2016, two discs drawing on fifteen entries in the series. It runs from the original through A Link to the Past, Link's Awakening, Ocarina of Time, Majora's Mask, The Wind Waker, Twilight Princess, and Skyward Sword, with eighteen composers and arrangers credited, Kondo and Kazumi Totaka among them.

Why it's worth purchasing

• Fifteen games on two discs in release order, 1986 through the Wii era
• Eighteen credited names, a reference for a catalog usually pinned on one composer
• The companion to the Super Mario set above: Nintendo's two defining songbooks

Nintendo - The Legend of Zelda 30th Anniversary Concert (Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra) CD

Columbia released this two-disc concert recording in February 2017, the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Taizo Takemoto with the Hyrule Chorus. Seven tracks per disc, nearly all long-form medleys built from Ocarina of Time, The Wind Waker, Twilight Princess, Skyward Sword, and A Link Between Worlds, closing on the main theme. This is the record for anyone who wants these melodies as concert music rather than cues.

Why it's worth purchasing

• Full orchestra and chorus, the series' themes arranged as symphonic suites
• Seven extended tracks per disc, so it plays as a program from start to finish
• The entry point if you come to this from film scores and classical records

Nintendo - The Legend Of Zelda: Breath Of The Wild Original Soundtrack CD

Breath of the Wild came out in March 2017 and rebuilt Zelda around open air and quiet. The Nippon Columbia soundtrack, released on April 25, 2018, documents all of it across five discs and 211 tracks. Manaka Kataoka, Yasuaki Iwata, and Hajime Wakai led the writing, and the score moves from single piano figures in the field to Sheikah electronics and full orchestral weight in the Divine Beast battles. This is the one we hand people who think game music still means chiptune.

Why it's worth purchasing

• Five discs, 211 tracks: the complete score, ambient fragments and all
• Space is the organizing idea, and only the full sequence shows how it works
• A crossover record for anyone who owns minimal and ambient piano albums

Nintendo - The Legend Of Zelda: Skyward Sword Original Soundtrack CD

Skyward Sword was the first Zelda game with a fully orchestrated score, and the complete release took ten years: Nippon Columbia put it out on November 23, 2021, five discs in a digipak holding 187 tracks. Hajime Wakai led the music with Takeshi Hama, Shiho Fujii, Mahito Yokota, and Masato Mizuta. A Limited Edition pressing adds a slipcase and a music box playing Ballad of the Goddess.

Why it's worth purchasing

• Five discs and 187 tracks, the complete score for the Wii entry
• A five-name composing team and the most ambitious orchestral writing in the series to that point
• The Limited Edition adds a slipcase and a working music box for collectors of Japanese editions

Various - The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild Vinyl LP Box Set

This is the one that broke the pattern. Nintendo worked with Laced Records to put Breath of the Wild on eight heavyweight LPs, 130 tracks and close to four hours, the first Nintendo soundtrack commercially released on vinyl outside Japan. Each side is sequenced around a theme rather than game chronology, so exploring, combat, the Divine Beasts, and the shrines each get their own stretch. A double LP edition gathers 34 cues.

Why it's worth purchasing

• Eight heavyweight LPs, 130 tracks, the first Nintendo score pressed outside Japan
• Thematic sequencing turns a 211-track score into something you can drop a needle on
• Printed inners, spined sleeves, and a rigid dual slipcase with the team's archival artwork

If You Like Nintendo

• Yasunori Mitsuda: his Chrono Trigger score is the other great Super Nintendo songbook, on vinyl and import CD.
• Nobuo Uematsu: the Final Fantasy composer, writing at novelistic scale while Kondo wrote in miniature.
• Hiroki Kikuta: the Secret of Mana and Trials of Mana scores, strange and percussive, on Japanese import CDs.
• C418: Minecraft Volume Alpha and Beta run on the same minimal piano and ambience.
• Anamanaguchi: a New York band playing through a modified Famicom, the sound chip as instrument rather than limitation.

Also on vinyl: Kazumi Totaka turns up on The Sounds of the Wii Ultimate Collection and the Animal Crossing Totakeke instrumental LP, and Yoko Shimomura wrote for Mario on the Super Mario RPG soundtrack.

Our video game soundtracks collection is where this wall lives, the Japanese pressings alongside the rest of our imported goods. For the wider field, our starter guide covers Castlevania, Final Fantasy, and the indie labels. To see everything Nintendo-credited at once, browse the Nintendo collection, then tell us which overworld theme you still hum.