Miki Higashino :: Biography

Note: This biography was written exclusively for Square Enix Music Online by Chris. The act of using it without advance written permission is regarded as a copyright infringement. It was last updated on August 25, 2007.

Miki Higashino, born on January 1, 1968, is a former Konami composer that has scored initial instalments of the Gradius, Salamander, Tokimeki Memorial, and Suikoden franchises while active between 1985 and 2001. Higashino joined Konami as a part-time composer in 1985 while still a student. Looking to fund her studies rather than initiate a career, she joined just as game music was to achieve prominence in Japan. As one of the company's few composers, she was given little direction and complete musical freedom in her projects. She initially created 13 compositions to accompany the massively successful space shooter Gradius, released in 1985 for the Arcade. She principally composed buoyant melodic music intended to stimulate listeners and send pleasant pulses to their shooter brains, among the most successful of these being "Challenger 1985" to accompany the first stage. However, some of the intermediate stage music and the series' trademark boss theme was composed with the purpose of creating tension, resulting in rhythmical eccentricities and repetition of certain intervallic leaps or motifs. A testament to its popularity is that the score influenced Yuzo Koshiro, Hitoshi Sakimoto, and Motoi Sakuraba to enter the industry. The upbeat mood of the game's music was maintained in subsequent Gradius scores, some of which Higashino had involvement in, as the series' musical style was refined and significantly evolved. The same year, Higashino scored the versus fighter Yie Ar Kung Fu. To fit the setting and fighting style of the game, the compositions were mostly created using oriental scales and a gong famously opened each stage. The subsequent year, she created the powerful melodies of the popular MSX vertical-scrolling shooter Knightmare.

By Higashino's fourth solo effort, 1986's Gradius spinoff Salamander, it was evident that her musicianship had significantly refined. The game still relied on attractive melodic compositions, but they were more thoroughly developed, had a more resolute mood, and featured mostly conventional rhythms. For its overseas adaptation Life Force, Higashino's score was mostly reused but she created new themes for the 2nd, 4th, and 5th stages giving them a more energetic rock-based feeling. The same year, she had her works reprised for the Nintendo port of the game and co-composed a new score for its MSX version with Motoaki Furukawa and Masahiro Ikariko. In 1989, she co-composed her final score for the series, Gradius III. Regarded by many as the definitive soundtrack in the series, it was the most energetic, melodically captivating, harmonically rich, and technically accomplished of Higashino's shooter works. Subsequently, she co-composed the energetic score to the space-based beat 'em up Surprise Attack and, by mixing obligatory arrangements of the series' main theme with memorable and fitting original compositions, the Arcade adaptation Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. While the Gradius and Salamander series were enjoying their peak of popularity in the early 1990s, she produced two arrangements for 1992's Salamander Again and the elaborate "ACT II-4" for 1993's Gradius in Classic II, performed by the London Philharmonic Orchestra a year later. Around the same time, she worked on several games that she was uncredited for. For instance, she enjoyed creating a line of scores for Konami's kids-targeted Picmo Learning System that never, for obvious reasons, received soundtrack releases.

In 1992, Higashino created the score for Contra III: The Alien Wars with Tappi Iwase and Masanori Adachi. The quasi-orchestral score was more dark and dramatic than her previous efforts, ideal for representing apocalyptic atmosphere and relentless pace of the hit run and gun title. The trio reunited the subsequent year to score a mixture of oriental and orchestral music for the RPG Mouryousenki Madara 2. While both scores were major successes, Higashino subsequently requested to not be assigned Super Nintendo scores due to her difficulty using the PCM modules. As a result, she worked on three memorable and challenging solo projects: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Tournament Fighters, extensively tinkering with the Mega Drive's FM sound modules to create a techno- and funk-influenced score as well as a variety of sound effects; Premier Soccer, working on everything except sound programming alone for the first and only time in her career; and Double Dribble, creating convincing dribbling sounds and beefed up snares and kicks despite the notorious limitations of the Mega Drive. In 1994, Higashino co-composed the huge score to the TurboGrafx-16's dating simulator Tokimeki Memorial with Mikio Saito, Seiya Murai, and Hiroe Noguchi. The game was an unprecedented success in Japan, endearing to many for its likeable characters and fun gameplay, resulting in it becoming one of the country's most recognisable gaming franchise and inspiring much merchandise. Its music portrayed the game's scenes fittingly while being a memorable and entertaining listen on a stand-alone basis. A testament to its popularity was the influx of album releases the game and its remakes and successors inspired — to date, there are over 150 Tokimeki Memorial album releases, including soundtracks, arranged albums, vocal collections, and drama CDs.

In 1995, Higashino composed the soundtrack to PlayStation RPG Suikoden, known as Genso Suikoden in Japan, with Tappi Iwase and Hiroshi Tamawari. The ethnically inspired but highly accessible soundtrack gushed with emotion, featured excellent sound quality, and was jam-packed with gems, such as Higashino's timeless main theme "Into a World of Illusions". Following its production, she coloured Tamawari's soundtrack to Vandal Hearts ~Ancient Lost Generation~ with ten compositions, but was soon assigned with a behemoth. For Suikoden II, she returned and composed all but seven of its 105 tracks spread across two volumes of soundtracks. Widely regarded to be Higashino's magnum opus, the soundtrack preserved the excellence of the original and, due to receiving prominent credits on the game and in its album releases, exposed Higashino's name in the West. As a consequence of her achievements, she was asked to contribute to the concept albums Ten Plants and 2197 by Nobuo Uematsu and Shinji Hosoe respectively. She also directed Genso Suikoden II Music Collection ~Orrizonte~, a fascinating arranged album that used archaic musical instruments and set precedent to numerous more arranged album releases. Higashino's final scores at Konami were the two Genso Suikogaiden scores, where she mixed original compositions with arrangements of her past work in enhanced sound quality. Unfortunately, she found the production the Suikoden series' scores, while rewarding, incredibly tiring. Her time at Konami was dominated by meetings with the sound production division and development teams, but she was also expected to create a large number of compositions and sometimes act as a team manager. This enormous about of responsibility resulted in a 12 hour working day, disrupted sleep patterns, and fatigue after finishing each of her projects.

After contributing a piano arrangement of her first major Konami composition, Gradius's "Challenger 1985", Higashino departed Konami and game music in general in 2002. Despite her departure, Higashino has left a significant legacy for the Suikoden, Gradius, and Tokimeki Memorial franchises. After unsuccessfully passing to Michiru Yamane and Masahiko Kimura's hands, Higashino's distinct style for the Suikoden series has since been preserved by Norikazu Miura in Suikoden V and Suikoden Tactics, while her trademark compositions for the series have been prominently featured in the series' scores since. Inspired by the success of the Suikoden II arranged album, her compositions for the series have since been arranged by a variety of external artists for eleven more arranged albums, including those for Celtic instruments, Asian instruments, vocals, piano, and orgel. In 2005, Higashino made a surprising but brief return to game music to score ten tracks for the PlayStation 2's Tsukiyo ni Saraba, developed by Blue Moon and published by Taito. She was scouted to the project by her friend Yasunori Mitsuda, whom she had met following the production of Ten Plants, and the pair used the opportunity to create a stylistic experiment. The entire score was composed in a jazz style for big band and some of Higashino's tracks also integrated rap samples. While not the return many would have desired, it was competently executed and added to the impressive stylistic breadth of her repertoire. In 2007, Higashino made a surprise guest appearance creating light-hearted vocal music for pop'n music 15 ADVENTURE. There is optimism that she may one day create some original instrumental or vocal albums. After all, she has mentioned her eagerness to create a French-themed album and once joked 'if someday, you go to a comic market, and find an old lady secretly selling CD's at the side that would be me'!