The glorious Super Mario Galaxy (2007) marked a big turning point in the series, shifting it in an exciting new direction and embracing new possibilities.

Launching on the hugely popular Wii, in many respects it’s the defining game on the console. An instant classic that bagged Game of the Year awards worldwide.

It’s still a wonderful game, but we also revisited its beautiful soundtrack recently. Composed by Mahito Yokota and Koji Kondo, it’s a magnificent thing and well worth celebrating

The Stunning Score to Super Mario Galaxy

Koji Kondo is legendary in the gaming industry and community, the man responsible for all the iconic noises and music from the Super Mario games.

However, it was Mahito Yokota was in control of the musical direction. He initially aimed for Latin American style of music and composed almost 30 tracks with bongos, drums, steelpans etc. It’d be interesting to hear that direction now, almost 20 years after the game launched, as it’d be weird playing the game with it.

Super Mario Galaxy’s game director, Yoshiaki Koizumi, even cleared the tracks for use. Only for Kondo, overseeing the project as supervisor, to reject the music.

Yokota was furious and almost resigned, but was instructed by Kondo to rethink the score as not something just for children, but for all ages. He later came back with three styles of music and presented them to Mario created, and all round industry legend, Shigeru Miyamoto.

That… is when the musical history of Super Mario changed (for the better).

Super Mario Galaxy Ramps Up the Orchestral Sweep

Crucially for the project, Miyamoto liked an orchestral piece of music. That had been composed by Kondo and was the musical directional then chosen.

Kondo and Yokota split duties between them for variation across the work.

The result was 28 pieces as performed by a 50 strong orchestra, a dramatic shift in style for the series. But one it’s maintained ever since. Rightly so, as it suits the joyous nature of the 3D games, in particular, so well. You can hear it on the Switch’s masterpiece Super Mario Odyssey (2017) and many more.

It makes the games feel epic, which was particularly important for the space-based nature of the 2007 classic. It worked a treat and remains a marvel.

There are some of the most unique pieces of music from the 40 year history of Super Mario here.

A main focus of it was to make the series appear cool, even sophisticated. Even now non-gamers often sneer at the hobby and consider it for socially awkward 13-year-old boys, but if they played the games they’d have fun.

Galaxy’s score emphasised that, with the title’s accessible gameplay and instant focus on exploration and fun, making for Nintendo’s most advanced outing in the series. We remember playing it in 2008 at our Fallowfield houseshare and our non-game playing housemates commented the game looked and sounded incredible.

But the composers did far more than just throw an orchestral sweep at the series and overhaul the iconic tracks, the work here is very unique and intriguing. Perfectly complementing every stage, helping players feel like they’re on an adventure.

Nintendo lazily get accused of “just releasing Mario games” over and over, but what the developer does is innovate and overhaul the experience each time out.

Within each new Mario universe there comes a wealth of changes and the Galaxy concept remains one of the most impressive things Nintendo has achieved. Still a joy to play and, as always, the glorious music is there to whisk you away with it.

A Special Mention for Tim Burnelis’ Super Mario Galaxy Piano Arrangements

The game is notable for its regular use of melodic piano pieces, almost melancholic in their structure, which work wonderfully well set to the epic scope of the game.

And that has led to musicians worldwide to make variations on that, as with Tim Burnelis and his YouTube account here (also, see his website Tim Burnelis Music). He’s from Surrey in England and

He’s actually done an entire piano collection that’s available on Spotify and YouTube. He’s taken key pieces from the score and arranged them all for piano. Very nice of him! Have a listen—it’s free.