Composer Giovanni Rotondo Announces New Tears of the Kingdom Fan Album, Invites Zelda Fans to Help Shape It
Posted on November 13 2023 by Heather Beard
Earlier this year, Tears of the Kingdom introduced the musical troupe The Stable Trotters. You will likely first encounter the troupe when you begin the Side Adventure “Serenade to a Great Fairy.” This quest line takes you across Hyrule as you look for the missing musicians in the troupe in order to coax each Great Fairy out of her cocoon and back into the world. The Stable Trotters’ adventure to serenade each Great Fairy was definitely a memorable one. It let us demonstrate the different skills that Tears of the Kingdom had to offer and showed us why music has always played an important part in Zelda games.
Composer Giovanni Rotondo, known for the 8-bit Time Adventures collection of fan albums, has begun his newest musical project inspired by Tears of the Kingdom‘s The Stable Trotters. Rotondo looked at previous composers of the Zelda series and saw how the music of The Legend of Zelda has resonated with players and listeners. The composer states that Zelda music holds “a rare quality,” and that fact has held true over the years. Rotondo felt a rekindled inspiration from Tears of the Kingdom and decided to take a unique approach with this next project.
The Stable Trotters are traveling Hyrule to awaken The Great Fairies with their music, and, like many musicians do when they tour, we could imagine that they travel with merchandise. Rotondo’s album is to be presented as an item that the troupe would sell at the end of their shows. Rotondo is even encouraging the musicians who are participating in the project to immerse themselves in The Stable Trotters’ story and to really capture the style of the troupe.
Beyond this unique concept, Rotondo is also using the project as an opportunity to collaborate with the Zelda community:
“The core idea for this album is to develop it in a collaborative spirit, inviting listeners to be a part of the creative process, aiming to create something we all will cherish once complete. Incorporating feedback on certain aspects of this album through surveys allows for shared input on which tracks to include, how the cover art should look, or what color the vinyl record might be and more. “
Rotondo is looking to get the audience involved with shaping different aspects of the project through a series of “Choice Quests” over the next few months. For his first Choice Quest, he is inviting Zelda fans to participate in selecting themes for the album’s tracklist. A survey has been created for those who are interested in sharing their ideas for themes. As a token of gratitude, Rotondo will also include the names of those who are the most engaged in the project in the vinyl record jacket of the final release.
Check out The Stable Trotters project page on Rotondo’s website right here for more information. Those who are interested in participating in the different aspects of the project can also join the composer’s Discord server right here or sign up for his newsletter right here. Rotondo plans to host a new Choice Quest every month until the album’s launch.
This looks like an exciting and fun project that will have a lot of opportunities to get the Zelda community involved in helping create an album inspired by The Stable Trotters. I am very excited to see where this leads, and I look forward to more quests to aid in the creation of this album in the future.
If you are excited by this project and want to know more about Giovanni Rotondo’s music, we previously covered his album The 8-Bit Time Capsule and talked to him about his music and career. Rotondo has worked on a myriad of outside projects including BBC1’s The Queen’s Platinum Jubilee, and Netflix’s Dark Desire and El Club.
What do you think of this upcoming album from Giovanni Rotondo? Do you plan on participating in the crowdsourcing decisions? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.
Source: Giovanni Rotondo
Hi I’m Heather! I’m Senior Editor and Art Director at Zelda Dungeon and I’ve been a member of the ZD team since 2019. I am a graphic designer, artist, and nerdy mom to an awesome little boy. When my nose isn’t in a book, working on my novel or watching anime you can find me curled up with my cats Mandy-Lynn and Daisy Mae.
