Composing Tchia: An Interview with John Robert Matz
Tchia, the charming open-world adventure game based on New Caledonian culture, releases today, so what better way to celebrate then by talking with the game’s composer, John Robert Matz. Like everything else in Tchia, the music can be described as joyful, authentic, and filled with a sense of wonder and excitement. Today, we’ll find out exactly what makes this game and its soundtrack so unique and captivating by speaking with this VGM veteran composer.
You’ve been composing for video games for almost 10 years now, so what have been the biggest life lessons that you've learned?
Oh, man, hahahah. I think it’s closer to 12, now, actually? *sweats*
The biggest life lessons… let’s see…
Don’t do any work you aren’t willing to lose without a contract.
Melody is God; come up with the right one first, and everything else will fall into place.
Even one live instrument can bring a piece of music to life, so do your best to put them front and center.
Even if you aren’t doing music implementation yourself, do your best to understand the capabilities of your middleware (or homebrew system) and let that affect how you build an interactive score.
Oh, here’s one I can say unequivocally: making friends in the game audio world is the best thing. Almost everyone here is lovely, and, for a group of people that are professionally competing against each other on the regular, we really all look out for each other. It’s a very wholesome gang.
That’s what comes to mind, at least at present.
How did Awaceb approach you for the Tchia soundtrack?
So, Phil Crifo and Thierry Boura, Awaceb’s founders, previously hired me for their first game, Fossil Echo, and I think they were very happy with the work I did on it. It was a blast to work on–a lovely, beautiful, painterly world–and it was hugely inspirational to my composer’s brain. The year after we shipped it, Phil happened to be in Los Angeles on vacation while I was down there for GameSoundCon, and we met up for lunch. He shared a video of an early prototype of the game with me and asked if I wanted to work with them again. Naturally, I said yes.
Would you say that this is the most ambitious soundtrack that you’ve worked on?
Quite possibly, yes. It certainly required a lot of musicological research into traditional New Caledonian music and instrumentation, featured a ton of choral work from New Caledonian vocalists, and it let me do something I’ve only gotten to do one previous time in a video game score: write songs. Heck, not only write them, but design songs to have gameplay elements and play-along parts so that you, the player, get to participate in bringing the music to life. That was a key element from the start. So, yeah, it’s definitely up there, hahahah.
At what point in the game’s development did you come onboard?
Pretty darn early. I think there was an earlier, smaller version of the starting island Uma, the first version of our protagonist Tchia, a simple one-note-at-a-time version of the ukulele that could play diatonically, and some basic running around and climbing mechanics, and that was it.
Were you familiar with New Caledonian culture before working on this project?
Only a little. While I worked with Phil and Thierry on Fossil Echo, I learned a bit about the island nation they grew up on and saw a bit of that culture bleeding into the fantasy world of that game. It wasn’t until I got the full briefing and learned that Tchia was going to be fully and directly inspired by New Caledonian folklore, culture, traditions, and music, that I really began my research.
Did you talk with local musicians to get a better understanding of New Caledonian music and culture?
Indirectly. That was probably one of the most challenging parts of the process–dealing with language barriers (I, unfortunately, do not speak French). Having to ask questions through interpreters made casual communications and interviews challenging, but we made the best of it that we could. One element that made it easier was being fortunate enough to track down some really outstanding (subtitled) documentaries on New Caledonian music–some featured interviews and discussions with some of our musicians. That kind of insight was invaluable.
What are some unique things that you learned about New Caledonian music?
Modern New Caledonian music takes cues from the world over (i.e. pop, rock, reggaeton, etc.), but prefers to color it with a handful of traditional textural elements that have survived French colonization of the islands.
There’s a distinct rhythmic element that figures prominently in a traditional type of Kanak dance: the Pilou. It’s a sort of “relaxed” dotted-eighth, sixteenth, or an “uptight” triplet quarter note, eighth note figure, and forms a constant rhythmic motor throughout. Many more modern popular Kanaka music uses it as well, as a sort of connective tissue to their traditional musical past.
Another fascinating element is that most of the percussive instruments used in traditional New Caledonian music are literally hewn and crafted from the vegetation of the island. Large hollow bamboo shoots are pounded against the ground to provide a bass drum-like pulse, tree-bark beaters stuffed with grass and plant fibers called Bwanjep carry a brighter, more resonant report, dried seed-pod clusters called Sonaï rattle and clatter as they’re strapped to the legs of dancers, and, for more intimate performances, a common, sturdy type of leaf that, when dried and brushed against each other, makes a distinct “ratcheting” percussive sound, and carries that same Pilou rhythm.
Fun fact on that last point: being leaves, they don’t generally survive more than a song or two. In practice, the musician playing them simply plucks a few more and performs the encore, but in our case we were fortunate enough to have Phil collect some while visiting family over Christmas and bring them home. Then, we sampled the leaves on his little portable audio recorder (as they disintegrated), and we turned them into a virtual instrument that was used throughout the score. (You even get to play them as Tchia!)
From what I’ve heard of the OST, there is a large emphasis on vocal folk music, and according to one video I watched, local musicians were hired for some of the tracks. Can you describe that process?
I wasn’t involved in the hiring process of the musicians, but writing for them had some unique challenges. Most of them didn’t read music, so the best way for them to learn their parts was to provide lyric sheets (with Marilou Lopez-Aguilera’s lovely lyrics) and to record all the vocal parts myself, learning the French or Drehu phonetically (I’m so sorry, everyone) and singing alternately well up into my falsetto and lower than I could physically sing without pitch-tweaking in post. I’d then export all the vocals together, and in isolation, and they’d be sent to the singers to learn. It was very important to us to feature local voices on the score as much as possible, and I’m so pleased with how it all came together in the end.
Music plays an integral role in storytelling with certain characters singing unique songs. Can you describe the process for developing those tracks?
Writing the songs began with composing the general melodies–usually me thinking about the place in the story the song would happen, the people singing it, and the vibe we want to convey–then recording it into my phone before the inspiration fled me. Then, I’d mock it up in Logic and send it over to Phil for his thoughts. If he liked it, we’d pitch it to Marilou, who’d come back a few days later with lyrics, and I’d mock something up with them, trying to figure out what part the player would play in the song.
I’d sketch out those parts with MIDI versions of the instruments Tchia would play in-game, and, using a bespoke system, export MIDI files from Logic for every “type” of sound that might be used in the piece. For instance, ukulele songs would have unique MIDI data tracks for “chord strum up”, “chord strum down”, “pluck high octave”, and “pluck low octave”. I’d write up an info TXT file and send it and all the MIDI data over to Ben, one of our coding wizards, who’d implement it into the song overlay, and voilà.
Early on, Tchia only has a single button control that plays hand percussion when you press it, but later, players gain access to the ukulele, and the music she plays becomes more sophisticated. I did my best as I was writing the player’s part to keep in mind the kind of stick and button gymnastics they’d have to grapple with. In other words, the goal was to gradually step up the difficulty as players advance through the game, moving from Tchia playing along with the melodies being played or sung, to more independent, sophisticated parts that allow the player to solo over the accompanimental backdrop.
The ukulele is an important tool for players, allowing players to control time, weather, and vegetation. Were you involved in the implementation of that feature?
I basically co-designed it with Phil Crifo. He had the initial idea for the “ring” approach for notes (inspired, in part, by Wandersong’s singing controls), and together we figured out how to cram every possible chord and note the real ukulele could manage across two octaves into a modern controller’s buttons and sticks. After we figured out what we needed and how to make it work, Gordon McGladdery over at A Shell in the Pit broke out his own ukulele and provided the samples, and FMod wizard Em Halberstadt implemented all the programming in FMod.
I also love the inclusion of free jam, which will allow players to make up their own tunes. Was that something you pushed for or was that the developers’ idea?
Oh, that was absolutely Phil’s vision from the start. He wanted to let people have the ability to play anything, cover any song, play along, or make up their own. Creating a flexible and versatile virtual instrument would have been overkill without Free Jam mode.
Do you think more people will pick up the ukulele after this game?
I hope so–I certainly did. There’s just something…joyous about it.
What are some of your fondest memories from working on this game?
Probably when I got the first choral recordings back and started to assemble them into my Logic session. They were so raw and real and full of emotion that the magic of what we were making suddenly struck me. I think every composer has that moment when they start to hear their music brought to life, interpreted by other musicians, other artists. I’ve felt that several times before, but here, something about these folks on the other side of the world pouring all the heart and spirit into this thing I created, something based on their art, their culture, and giving it their all, just…really impacted me.
I had that same pang–right there in the heart–every time I received recordings of the songs I wrote for our voice actors to sing. There’s one song, a late one in the game (I won’t spoil it), that may have elicited a damp eye or two as I was mixing.
What advice do you have for newer composers trying to break into the VGM scene?
It’s…not easy. Make friends. Meet developers, sound designers, and your fellow composers, and do your best to make lasting, human relationships. Aim for that instead of “networking,” and you’ll have a good start, and some new, awesome friends.
After that…it’s all down to working on your craft, improving your production quality, and coming to grips with interactive music systems.
Y’know, easy stuff. *sweats*
John Robert Matz is a G.A.N.G. Award-winning, ASCAP Composer’s Choice Award-nominated composer, and was named G.A.N.G.’s “Rookie of the Year” for 2017. He has written music for games as diverse as the BAFTA-nominated “Gunpoint”, the cult-classic “Artemis: The Spaceship Bridge Simulator”, the recent Steam hit, “For The King”, and the multi award-winning “Fossil Echo”. When not composing, he is a professional voice actor, classical voice teacher, tenor, and trumpet player.