INSiGHT: Interview with Arnie Roth

Walking down the aisle to Aerith's theme on my wedding day, it's fair to say that the music of Final Fantasy VII has always played a big part in my and my husband's lives. As such, it was a no-brainer to decide we simply needed to attend the Final Fantasy VII Rebirth Orchestra World Tour in London.

As luck would have it, we were granted an interview with Arnie Roth himself a couple of days prior to the show. Arnie Roth started as a violinist, but over time became more and more involved in conducting, directing and producing orchestral performances. Since 2007, he is probably best known to the gaming world as the one in charge of Distant Worlds: music from Final Fantasy in collaboration with Square Enix. These live orchestra performances of the fantastic soundtracks from the Final Fantasy series have seen sold out concert halls all over the world.

Interview with producer and conductor Arnie Roth

During our interview, we were able to talk to Roth a bit more about his career path to becoming a conductor.

"I was a violinist for a million years. [...] I was doing an awful lot of recording work, national television, radio, as well as records and albums and movies and I started doing more composition and scoring, writing. [...] A lot of the artists that I was working with would ask me for one chart or two charts or a couple of things and eventually full live orchestra shows and they would ask me to come out and conduct these things. [..] One thing led to another where I ended up conducting more things than I ever planned on."

Seeing that Mr Roth was very classically trained, I was interested to hear what the difference between classical music and video game soundtracks, in particular for Final Fantasy, were. Roth replied that he doesn't "really think of them as different at all, actually". He continued to explain:
 

"The scores that we play with Final Fantasy, especially the original scores that Uematsu worked on with the main arranger that he used [...], Hamaguchi, who was just a genius… He did spectacular work. But those are very much classically written. And if you look at Nobuo Uematsu's output, it's very much traditional writing."

In other words, it seemed that thanks to Uematsu-san and Hamaguchi-san, the music was already part way there and only needed a little adjustment to be orchestra-ready.

"It's all about melody and structure. And if you're going to write that way, then it's going to have a certain logic that works in classical music."

Especially important here was how distinct every single track is in Final Fantasy. This really contributes to the music standing out and working particularly well as a live concert.

"But the fact that Uematsu started out in 1987 with the thought that every character was going to have its own theme, every battle, every new world or environment, every new love relationship, every quest. Each one has its own identifiable melody. And that melody is written in a very traditional manner, eight-bar phrases, this kind of thing. And because of that, it works very well in terms of orchestrating these things for a full symphony orchestra.
So, I think you really have to give a lot of credit to, in the case of Final Fantasy, Uematsu setting the template. And we've basically been following that template."

Roth continues to explain how this way of writing music, in particular for video games, is not at all common.

"There are many video game scores and I've played, I've conducted many of them, that are not written [like Final Fantasy]. They're written more about environmental or sound design. Seems to be a bigger concentration than an actual compelling melody that you might walk away from, stuck in your head. And because of that, I would say that's a big difference between the Final Fantasy music and a lot of other video games: that it is so music driven."

It seems that because the Final Fantasy music is written in such a distinct way, it just works well in concert.

"There's plenty of other types of video game music concerts, ones that involve an arranger's fantasy on themes, right? And that happens a lot… Zelda, Sonic, Elden Ring… But again, there's as much about the arranger in there as there is the original conductor. They're taking a theme and working it into sometimes very wonderful arrangements, but that's very different from the Final Fantasy concert that we present.
Not just this one, VII Rebirth, but all the Distant Worlds Final Fantasy concerts. Because we're trying to present the music as close to the way as fans have heard it in the game. And then second of all, when we do orchestrate things that were originally eight-bit, we're trying to be very faithful to what was originally written. And I think this is something that makes these concerts stand apart from a lot of the other ones."

Roth also talked a bit about the history of how video game concerts came about to be, starting out with movies and live orchestras until finally culminating in what we were able to visit today: a full on concert themed around the Final Fantasy soundtrack.

"When I first started doing work with Final Fantasy and Square Enix, there literally were no video game music concerts anywhere outside of Japan. I'm talking about 2004, 2005. So, at that time they were just starting the whole idea of live orchestra with movies and they were just thinking about things.
They tried the Wizard of Oz with orchestra, those kinds of things. And there was some success. Now, of course, it's blossomed into a huge industry. And the reason is that you're able to bring in a lot, many more new fans that might not normally be going to orchestra concerts and they're getting exposed. So, I think it's a very valuable thing from that standpoint."

Now, how does one organise such a massive concert tour? Roth explained some of the issues he faces when organising a tour like this.

"One of the issues is that it's always a very expensive proposition. You're talking about 100 musicians on stage, plus a video screen and some production stuff.
We often look for… either there's a critical venue that's available or a combination of a great orchestra and a venue, because it's not like a rock tour where we can string together… Let's say, we'll do all the UK cities, or Irish and UK cities and Scottish, just in one big tour… You can't really do it that way."

In other words, organising these concerts is a lot trickier than it seems. It is not for lack of wanting or trying - sometimes the pieces simply don't fall into place. However, Roth does explain that it is most definitely not for a lack of wanting to play in other areas. Scotland and Ireland especially seem to be on the radar here!

"But the good news is, there are plenty of places that we haven't played, even though Distant Worlds has been around for a long time, and we certainly want to do dates in Scotland, dates in Ireland."

One of the most burning questions may be whether Roth himself has played any of Final Fantasy titles himself. With a chuckle, he answered:

"I've got it right here on my phone. Final Fantasy VII, the original, is right here on my phone. That's my official answer. The reality is, that they're very difficult games. And they take a lot of time. And I mean, I don't really have the time for all those games. 
I do reference them, and I do work directly with all the composers of Final Fantasy, and Square Enix directly. And I get the official clips of music that I'm working on so I can understand how it's being used in the game. But yeah, I hate to say that I'm not really a gamer per se, but I have tried."

Considering the precision with which he manages to catch the feeling of every song he brings to the stage, it is fair to say he knows what he is doing, even without having played the games. After all, he is not wrong: each and every Final Fantasy title is a long and, at times, difficult game to play!
Asking about Roth's favourite song was apparently very difficult to answer! It must be hard to choose between so many fantastic songs.

"You're asking all the most difficult questions. Even Nobuo and I, when we get these questions, he has the same reaction. It's impossible. You know, too, he will tell you maybe what his favourite game is… And I can say the same thing: Do I love doing the opera from Final Fantasy VI? Yes! Do I love doing "Dancing Mad" from Final Fantasy VI? Yes! Do I love doing some of the new [Final Fantasy] XIV scores with Soken? Yes, absolutely! And [Final Fantasy] XVI. But just as well, I can appreciate the stuff that Sakimoto did in [Final Fantasy] XII. 
And I love working with Hamauzu. His score is not just in [Final Fantasy] XIII, but he has a tremendous amount of scores in Remake and Rebirth. He's one of the main composers they're using in there. We're playing several of his on the concert this weekend. 
So yeah, there's just there's so many, you know, so many great battle themes, so many great great great songs too, actually."

It seems to be a difficult choice, but Roth does mention again that especially the music from Final Fantasy VI is great to play for an orchestra. However, he continues to talk about how every game's soundtrack translates really well into an orchestra score, thanks to Uematsu.

"But I think some of the greatest achievements from the games that work on the concert hall stage, I would have to point to those Final Fantasy VI items: the opera and "Dancing Mad", in terms of an achievement that is so perfect for the concert situation. A lot of the other ones, we're doing an adaptation.
What the composers do these days is, they tend to use a certain amount of prerecorded elements along with their orchestration. So there's an orchestra along with some kind of a pre-laid synthesiser or an electronic track of some sort that's going with it. 
So, we present those tracks completely live with the orchestra, but again you have to do some orchestration to get close to what that is and make it sound exactly right. And so I'm saying there's always some adjustment that happens with that. 
[...] It's kind of amazing to look at all the music from Final Fantasy I through VII and see how easily all that stuff translates into full orchestra charts. This is again a big compliment to Uematsu; that his music translated so well to concert arrangements."

Another big question for Roth was whether there were any other video game soundtracks he enjoyed. Indeed, he does like music from the Legend of Zelda and Elden Ring!

"I love a lot of the Zelda music. There's a couple of other ones… I'm looking at Elden Ring."

Roth continues with another little known fact of how he was involved with Halo!

"I worked on the original Halo. It's a little known fact, but I actually helped with the arrangement and I actually recorded the original Halo theme, the very first Halo one because the two composers [...] Martin O'Donnell and Michael Salvatori were based in Chicago, where I'm based, and so we worked on that with them."

Another soundtrack I personally really love is Octopath Traveler, and so I simply had to ask if Roth had heard about it. His answer sure surprised me!

"That's funny! There's now maybe about five people that have specifically said that title to me. I think you're all plotting or something here!
It's really interesting because that specific game… I was just in Japan just a few weeks ago doing these concerts, Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, and one of the Square Enix people actually brought that up to me, Octopath. And then, whether it's coincidence or a plot here, a couple of fans in different places like Singapore, Toronto last week… they're all mentioning Octopath and here you are! So, clearly there is something there. 
I mean, [Square Enix are] sending me all the music to check out and see what kind of production… if we can do anything with it. I don't know if we can, but we're going to look at it."

If this isn't exciting, I don't know what is!

Finally, does the Final Fantasy music play differently from classical Western-style music? Roth says No, and that is because of his friend and colleague Nobuo Uematsu, who incorporates a Western style of music in his own writing.

"No, as a matter of fact I find that it is again, if you're talking about Uematsu specifically, if one is talking about that, it's actually very traditional.  And if you know Nobuo at all, I mean, I'm close with him, good friends and colleagues… It's very famous that he listened to all kinds of 80s pop, rock stuff, a big Elton John fan and all that kind of stuff. But he's a huge fan of Tchaikovsky, of Prokofiev, of Brahms. These are all melody and structure driven."

In other words, this style of writing, melody and structure driven, is what makes the music from Final Fantasy so memorable, and it is not much different from the famous classical composers.

While talking to Arnie Roth, I could not help but think how friendly and down-to-earth he is. It is very clear that his true passion is music and as fans of Final Fantasy, we can count ourselves lucky that he is in charge of bringing the soundtrack onto the stage for us.

The Final Fantasy VII Rebirth Orchestra World Tour

Moving on to the concert itself, which took place in the Royal Albert Hall in London. The hall has been around for a very, very long time (since 1871 actually!), and has seen a huge number of big names perform. After going through security and having our bags checked, we immediately queued for the merch stand, in a queue that was sufficiently long. There wasn't a whole lot available: a tour booklet, a t-shirt, the official orchestra recording on CD, additional Distant Worlds media (such as CDs and Vinyls), a small, light-up Buster sword… It was all quite expensive but it was a special day, so walking away with a couple of CDs and a t-shirt was a bit of a must. As it turned out, merch stands in other parts of the building also offered Moogles and Cactuar plushies, and it was a bit weird that these weren't available at all merch stands.

Looking around, there was many a Final Fantasy t-shirt or other accessory to be seen, but also a whole lot of cosplayers, all of which did a fantastic job with their cosplay. It was truly a sight to behold.
We then moved on upwards to find our seats and grab a drink before the show. Getting lucky, we had managed to book two seats in a four-seat box on the balcony, and our seats were the two in the front. The view was fantastic, the box offered sufficient private space to put down our bags and relax. There was even an offer to receive food and drinks in there!

Right on time, the musicians appeared on stage and started tuning their instruments - the show was about to begin. Arnie Roth appeared on stage, a round of applause welcoming him, and the first song was played. The huge monitor behind the stage showed clips of the game while the music played. Most of the time they followed the theming of the songs but occasionally there was a mismatch. For example, slow music was sometimes accompanied by action footage, or vice versa. For the majority of the concert, however, the clips were well chosen.

The sound was fantastic, which is probably in part due to the ideal layout of the hall. The musicians, including the choir, did an amazing job, and the whole concert felt absolutely magical. It almost felt as though the 30 minute intermission, though an important break, was too long - we wanted more!

It is absolutely fair to say that for a couple of songs, tears were shed due to the sheer beauty of the arrangements. Arnie Roth did a stunning job here. When he left the stage towards the end of the concert, it seemed it was over too soon - but luckily, he returned for a final two songs.

The very last song was truly emotional, and here and there people discreetly wiped away a tear or two. The beauty of the music, the clips of the game and the credits that started rolling, as well as the knowledge that it was already over… who could blame us?

The whole show was absolutely fantastic, and well worth the visit!