Nominees named for first ever video game Grammy Award
History in the making.
Next year's Grammy Awards will include the first ever Grammy for video game music.
Games nominated for the Best Score Soundtrack for Video Games and Other Interactive Media include Call of Duty, Assassin's Creed, and Marvel's Guardians Of The Galaxy.
Previously, video games were included in the Score Soundtrack for Visual Media category, but now there's a brand new separate category.
The full list of nominees is as follows:
- Aliens: Fireteam Elite (Austin Wintory)
- Assassin's Creed Valhalla: Dawn Of Ragnarok (Stephanie Economou)
- Call Of Duty: Vanguard (Bear McCreary)
- Marvel's Guardians Of The Galaxy (Richard Jacques)
- Old World (Christopher Tin)
Whoever triumphs, it will be a historic win for the new award.
Studios have been lobbying for some time to have video games recognised at the awards.
Variety reported news of the new category announcement in October. Steve Schnur, worldwide executive and president of music for Electronic Arts, described video game music as "overlooked and underappreciated", while Star Wars game composer Gordy Haab described its "unique creative requirements".
"The most obvious challenge is interactivity: music that can adapt and change in real time based on the consumer's input, while continually maintaining musicality and interest," he said. "There's really no other form of music-making quite like it."
Composer Austin Wintory was nominated for his work on Journey back in 2013 and has since been persuading colleagues to join the Recording Academy and enter their work for consideration.
Only paying Recording Academy members can nominate a Grammy entry.
Earlier this year, Kirby won a Grammy. Or at least, arrangers Charlie Rosen and Jake Silverman won the award for Best Arrangement, Instrumental or A Cappella for their Big Band arrangement of Meta Knight's Revenge from Kirby Superstar.
Before that, Christopher Tin won Best Instrumental Arrangement with Vocalist(s) in 2010 for a song composed for Civilization 4.