George Sanger (musician)
George Alistair Sanger ( born December 14, 1957), also known under the pseudonym of " The Fat Man" and " The Fatman ", is an American composer for computer games.
Life
Private
George Sanger was on 14 December 1957 as the second of seven children of the anesthetist bottom and the gynecologist George Sanger sr. born. His brother David Sanger is the drummer for the country band Asleep at the Wheel. In his childhood he attended Coronado High School in Coronado (California ), near San Diego. After school, he attended Occidental College, where he studied physics and obtained a bachelor's degree with a music major. He was accepted at Loyola Marymount 's Television Production School and the USC Film School. George Sanger is married to Linda Sanger, with whom he has a son named Glen and a daughter named Sandy. His son Glen is a co-founder of the game development studios Spark Brilliance Productions in Austin.
Career start
After his studies, George Sanger worked for some time for various recording studios in Los Angeles before he was active as a composer in the computer game industry in 1983 for the first time. He is considered one of the pioneers of computer game music, at a time when accompanying music still did not have a high priority in the game production:
"At the time, It Should Be remembered, there what almost no competition at all Writing music for games what Considered to be at the artistic level of, say, writing the tones did tell the McDonalds ' workers did the french fries are ready. "
" It should be remembered that there was almost no competition at this time. Writing music for computer games was seen at approximately the same artistic level as, say, the composition of the beeps that tell the McDonald's employees that the fries are done. "
His first musical contribution to a computer game was a zehnsekündiges instrumental piece called Carnival of the Penguins for the Intellivision game Thin Ice, for which he was asked by David Warhol, a game developer and college roommate of his brother Rick, and in return receives € 1,000 received. After this brief foray into the gaming industry Sanger wrote for the time being music for commercials and assumed smaller works, such as the music for the NES version of the Lucasfilm Games title Maniac Mansion. 1985 Sanger moved to Austin (Texas ), where he ran a recording studio, among others.
On the initiative Warhol he came into contact with Brian Moriarty, who developed the Adventure Loom at this time for Lucasfilm Games. Moriarty asked Sanger, for this game MIDI music based on Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake to adapt. From also based in Austin developer Origin Systems, he was also awarded the contract for the creation of the soundtrack for the space flight simulation Wing Commander. Both games were released in 1990. As support for the Wing- Commander - order Sanger hired the musician Dave Govett, whom he knew from his time as a studio operator. Since the game is supported sound cards type Sound Blaster, Sanger could draw for the composition of the leading quality technology at this time. Added to this was that the game was one of the first games that put on a reactionary soundtrack. Thus, the background music is matched dynamically to the events of the mission history, for example, loading a short melody victories on successful launch of an opponent. Both the soundtrack to Loom as well as to Wing Commander were proposed at the Spotlight Awards during the Game Developers Conference for the award for best game soundtrack, the prize went to Sanger for Wing Commander. The high critical acclaim increased Sanger's reputation in the gaming industry, it was followed by numerous other jobs.
Since then, Sanger wrote the incidental music for over 200 computer games. He is regarded as a composer of the first General MIDI games soundtracks, the first recorded directly in the MIDI format live music recording, the first included on accompanying audio CD soundtrack for a computer game and the first soundtrack, which was used as a selling point for a game.
Other activities
Sanger worked closely with the musicians Dave Govett, Joe McDermott and Kevin Weston Phelan. Together forming the quartet since 1992, the so-called Team Fat. In addition to the composition of music Sanger and Phelan were also working on Tonbibliotheken for General MIDI interface in order to guarantee the uniform playing their own compositions. This Tonbibliotheken were integrated among other things, with the support of the manufacturer in the Yamaha sound chip OPL2 and OPL3, the basis of many sound cards such as the SoundBlaster or AdLib brands were.
Sanger is the initiator of various activities to strengthen the sound range in the games industry. The objectives of his work formulated in 1995 under the title " Manifatso " in which he expresses, among other things for the creation of expressive, non- repetitver and artistically free and independent music for computer games. Sanger called the annual conference " Project Bar -BQ " and " Project Horseshoe ", which sees itself as a think tank for audio applications, as well as the audio library gameplay Music. Sanger still engaged successfully with leading game composer for the admission of computer game music to the Grammy Awards, which since the 42nd Grammy Awards 2000 in the categories " compiled Best Soundtrack Album for film, television or visual media ", "Best -composed soundtrack music for film, television or visual Media "and" Best Song written for film, television or visual media " is effective.
Public perception
Sanger is considered audacious showman who plays with his artistic identity of a loud Texan cowboys. His stage name is at odds with his actual stature. His trademarks include flashy rhinestone suits of the Ukrainian- American fashion designer Nudie Cohn, in conjunction with a Stetson cowboy hat and thick cigars. 1994, as part of a contribution for the People Magazine, the author Steve Dougherty described him as " a candidate for the most productive and most obscure living American composers ." Gary Andrew Poole of Wired magazine called Sanger in 1997 as "a kind of superstar " whose " rich compositions are far away from the beeping and bubbling, which is characterized most games soundtracks ".
Awards
- In the first Spotlight Awards during the Games Developer Conference Game Developers Conference Sanger received for his soundtrack to the Wing Commander Music Award. One of the three nominated soundtrack also includes Sanger's composition for the Adventure Loom.
- As part of the Game Developers Choice Awards 2007 Sanger received the IGDA Award For Community Contribution, in recognition of his many contributions to promoting interactive audio design and development of the gaming industry as a whole.
Games compositions
- Maniac Mansion ( 1988 NES version )
- Wing Commander (1990 )
- Loom (1990)
- Wing Commander II ( 1991)
- Ultima Underworld: The Stygian Abyss (1992 )
- Master of Orion (1993 )
- The 7th Guest (1993 )
- The 11th Hour (1995 )
- Evil Genius ( 2004)
Discography
The Fat Man And Team Fat
- 7/11 (1997)
- Surf.com (1997)
- Flabby Rode (1998)