SirPsycho Composer Compendium baldur's gate, Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance, cavedog, dungeon siege, eidos, elder scrolls, freddi fish, giants citizen kabuto, Harry Potter, humongous entertainment, icewind dale, interplay, jeremy soule, Julian Soule, lucasarts, morrowind, neverwinter nights, pajama sam, putt putt, revenant, secret of evermore, socom, spy fox, squaresoft, star wars, star wars bounty hunter, The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind, total annihilation

Jeremy Soule is largely considered to be one of the greatest composers in the history of games, but like all stories it starts quite humbly. He could be considered to be a true prodigy, he began taking private lessons from music professors at Western Illinois University and believes he learned the equivalent of a Master’s Dgree in composition before he even finished high school. He has no Master’s, but hey, degrees are just receipts saying you paid for the official classes right?

He sent out a mixtape and portfolio to two influential companies after he finished high school, LucasArts and Square. Square hired him quite quickly as the composer for a game they were making which was fully staffed by Westerners. The game was based on the Secret of Mana engine and was released as Secret of Evermore in 1995. Evermore has become quite a cult classic lately, as it has a unique atmosphere and feeling in the SNES library.

His portfolio to LucasArts was not wasted however, and when Square moved their office Soule left to join Humongous Entertainment. Humongous was founded by LucasArts alum Ron Gilbert. For the next couple of years he worked on children’s point and click adventure games from series such as Freddi Fish, Putt-Putt, Pajama Sam, and Spy Fox.

Thankfully, he would be pulled away from the children’s game soundtracks to produce the orchestral arrangements for the cult classic RTS Total Annihilation by Cavedog, who were under the Humongous umbrella.

Jeremy Soule would become more of a freelance after his stint at Humongous games, adding talents to publishers such as Interplay, Eidos, Microsoft, and EA. For Eidos he would compose the soundtrack for their action RPG Revenant, but would have more success for Interplay’s entry into that genre, Icewind Dale.

In a previous Compendium (Mark Morgan’s), Soule was mentioned as having worked on Planet Moon Studios’ first game, Giants: Citizen Kabuto. His brother, Julian Soule was also part of the sound design team for the game, but was uncredited. Julian works closely with his brother but is still mostly uncredited in most of their works. In 2001 he would work on Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance, Icewind Dale: Heart of Winter, and Final Four 2002!

Despite these more serious games under his belt Jeremy found himself still making music for children’s games. Rugrats Totally Angelica Boredom Buster, Rugrats in Paris, Beauty and the Beast, more Putt-Putt, and the video game adaptations of Harry Potter and the Sorceror’s Stone and Chamber of Secrets, as well as Quidditch World Cup in 2003.

The previous year, 2002, was one of the real breakout years for Jeremy Soule’s music, as he crafted many of his classic soundtracks for many classic games. Just a sample of his work includes Dungeon Siege, Neverwinter Nights, SOCOM: U.S. Navy SEALs, Star Wars: Bounty Hunter, and The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind. Prepare for the flood.

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