Town Theme | Zelda II: The Adventure of Link Orchestral Arrangement

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Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLQ58HYTDzLvJbJUP1WPuTMj5DATMUCEr4
I wanted this track to be really chill, as it's the only gentle piece within the whole soundtrack. The opening bars in my version are pulled from the FDS title theme. The melody in the 4 bars is overlaid over the same US counterpart that sounds similar to the Town theme. Now I've succeeded in porting over every unique characteristic from the Japanese version! By separating them and placing them in sequence, I feel the melody feels complete. The original town theme by itself always sounded to me like it started off already halfway through, but the Japanese FDS melody lets me build up to it organically.

The progression of this track highlights my general experience going through each of the first 7 towns in the game. The towns really help in portraying a lush and populated world. I imagine after the years of living in hiding from Ganon in the first game, it's encouraging to see all these settlements pop up and thrive. Everyone has Link to thank for being able to live normally, and some are eager to help, others a bit standoffish, and others are straight up spies of Ganon, which is why my track makes a brief dark turn in the middle. It's interesting that each town is almost like a one stop shop for Link to replenish health and magic, learn a new spell, and sword abilities, and also provides deeper lore among the surrounding areas. It's some pretty heavy lifting the game does through the towns.

For inspiration I took a lot of influence from not other Zelda town themes, but rather the Heroes of Might and Magic series. A lot of town themes in the various games have a really relaxing idyllic tone while still providing great character. I made an effort to utilize brass instruments in the forefront while still keeping the track cozy and relaxing. The strings section was particularly challenging, as I was pulling from 5 different libraries just to get the articulations I wanted.

Support me at https://www.patreon.com/thesecondnarrator

Arrangement and illustrations by Jeremiah Sun
Original Theme by Akito Nakatsuka

#ZeldaII #Calm #Orchestra