Peter Connelly announces Tomb Raider: The Dark Angel

In the same vein as Nathan McCree's The Tomb Raider Suite, the Tomb Raider: The Dark Angel project aims to re-record legacy franchise composer Peter Connelly's soundtracks to Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation (1999), Tomb Raider: Chronicles (2000) & Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness (2003). The project has been in development for over two years and is being slated for funding via Kickstarter, following The Tomb Raider Suite's success in reaching 121% of its goal.

"The album will not be a direct copy of the original Tomb Raider games’ scores, although it will remain faithful to those classic soundtracks. The music will be transformed and rearranged using techniques and personnel that were simply not available or within reach 15–20 years ago. Connelly intends to bring the musical compositions and recordings up to date and provide the listener, not only a sense of nostalgia, but with a whole new experience of this familiar and much-loved Tomb Raider music." - Press release

It should be noted that "The original versions of Connelly’s pieces will also be made available, properly remastered and beautifully presented, to tie-in with the new orchestral album so that fans can enjoy the original scores in the best possible quality" - something The Tomb Raider Suite project is yet to offer for the still unreleased soundtracks to Tomb Raider I, II & III (1996-1998) in over 20 years of the franchise.

Despite the soundtrack to Angel of Darkness having been recorded at Abbey Road Studios with the London Symphony Orchestra in 2002, Connelly promises that "all of the music, TR6 included, will be re-arranged in the same way that TR4 and TR5 will be re-mastered so they're all part of the same "family". The Last Revelation & Chronicles will benefit immensely as their soundtracks were limited by the software-instrumentation technology of the times. Personnel includes masters in their field - Dr Richard Niles, Isobel Griffiths & Tomb Raider alumnus Martin Iveson.

The Kickstarter campaign launches on October 1st, and the studio album is set to be recorded and produced at the state-of-the-art Air Lyndhurst Studios in London. Formats, distribution & pledge tiers are yet to be announced, but for upcoming information please visit the Tomb Raider: The Dark Angel website.

Retrospective: The Arcade interviews Peter Connelly

Peter Connelly and official Lara Croft model Jill De Jong at Abbey Road Studios, 2002

Legacy composer Peter Connelly, responsible for helming the Tomb Raider franchise from Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation (1999) through Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness (2003), the latter a joint effort with Martin Iveson, was recently interviewed in a fascinating retrospective:

"I wasn’t forced to keep anything from Nathan’s work but I thought it would’ve been a sacrilege to disregard it so it naturally became the heart or inspiration of most of my work. Obviously, I wanted to put my own stamp on things, as anyone would, which I did, but, as long as I held onto the authenticity of the original music, I knew I was onto a winner as Nathan’s music was already tried, tested and working beautifully within the franchise." - Peter Connelly

Connelly's predecessor, Nathan McCree, is set to release re-recordings of his music presented as The Tomb Raider Suite. When asked if Connelly would consider pursuing a similar project, he replied "Yes. I have a lot of these ideas playing around in my head and they need releasing". Also as part of the Tomb Raider 20th Anniversary, the full interview with Peter Connelly is available at The Arcade.

The famous pedestrian crossing at Abbey Road Studios, led by Jill De Jong

Peter Connelly plans re-recordings & merchandise for Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation, Chronicles & Angel of Darkness

Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation (1999), Chronicles (2000) & The Angel of Darkness (2003) composer Peter Connelly has indicated plans to turn to Kickstarter funding for a fresh rehash of his work on the titles, as well as the commercial release of his original Tomb Raider 4, 5 & 6 soundtracks:

"I have plans... BIG PLANS... plans to set up a Kickstarter project to help fund a remake of my Tomb Raider 4 - The Last Revelation, Tomb Raider 5 - Chronicles and, with the help and / or blessing of Martin Iveson (AOD co-writer), Tomb Raider 6 - Angel of Darkness OSTs. The production will be huge and the merchandise available will be a something to pledge for..."

Pledge-dependent merchandise to follow could include digital soundtrack downloads, limited edition signed CD box sets (including both the original soundtracks and planned re-recordings), the 5.1 surround-sound Angel of Darkness soundtrack on DVD, vinyl releases and accompanying musical score on sheet to boot.

Details should follow Connelly jumping through legality hoops - but the serious intentions of the project have been intimated. If successful, the composer will be making the first standalone purchasable soundtrack releases for aforementioned titles in over a decade. With fellow classic Tomb Raider composer Nathan McCree also set to make big announcement(s), 2015 is turning out to be particularly sonorous.

Connelly releases "Tomb Raider: Angel of Darkness - Original Abbey Road Mixes"

Today Tomb Raider classics composer Peter Connelly has released a 31 track album entitled "Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness - Original Abbey Road Mixes (2002)". The downloadable package includes rare and unreleased material in MP3 format at 320kbps. In the words of the man himself:

"No game rips here!!! These are the raw and untouched final mixes direct from Abbey Road studios. Music written by Peter Connelly / Martin Iveson. Performed by the London Symphony Orchestra, June 2002." - PC

Various takes of the same cues that do not appear in game are present, and cut-scene scores that until now have remained rarities also make an appearance.

Follow this fetching link for collection via his soundcloud! Thanks to TudorTulok for the heads up.

Update 18th July 2012: A 32nd track, "Paris Intro FMV", has been added to the SoundCloud release. This marks the 10th anniversary of the recording sessions.

Rarity #3: AOD's complete introduction music

Continuing MoTR's Rarities series is an entry from the last of Core Design's classics, Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness, released in 2003. The game's score is composed by Peter Connelly, with contributions by Martin Iveson. It is a unique iteration of the series in that the soundtrack was performed live by the London Symphony Orchestra at the famous Abbey Road Studios in 2002 (orchestrated by Peter Wraight and conducted by David Snell).

A large portion of TRAOD's score was officially released under enclosure - purchasable within a limited window of opportunity alongside the region-variant collector's editions of the game. The identical material was provided either on DVD (amongst other content) or in a standalone and promotional audio CD format. Details will be available soon in our commercial discography catalogue.

However, as with any conventional soundtrack release, material is missing. And especially attributed to the Tomb Raider soundtracks, a commonly absent entity is a musical cue that accompanies a cut-scene. Surprisingly, this particular rarity actually opens Angel of Darkness (during the "chase" cinematic), so it's rare status is of a higher degree. While parts of the video's music is accounted for (and the footage below is cut down to reflect this) - simply re-used pieces that also feature in-game - a lengthy and dramatic piece from 0:44 seconds onwards is entirely unobtainable in it's raw form:

A unique and specific score to the chase scene, as an unusually dishevelled Croft escapes French police dogs in an urban alleyway, the piece incorporates a variation of the original Tomb Raider motif (heard from 1:13) composed by Nathan McCree in 1996 - for the first time in film-like fashion. Also unaccounted for, the first 20 seconds of music features in several cut-scenes throughout the game. Ignore 0:20 to 0:44; this music is obtainable via our soon-to-be-detailed community developed soundtracks - it plays during the fight with Brother Obscura in the Tomb of Ancients and thus exists in the program files. While not shown, the beginning and the end of this introduction cinematic feature similarly acquirable tracks.

Update: With the release of Tomb Raider: Angel of Darkness- Original Abbey Road Mixes, the music from 0:20-0:44 is now accounted for; it is a snippet from the recording known as "The Search for Ekhardt". 18 July 2012: Additionally, the "Paris Intro FMV" was released today. This entire Rarity is now accounted for.

Square Enix Music Interview with Peter Connelly

Connelly et al recording @ Abbey Road Studios

Rarely seen these days, Tomb Raider classics composer Peter Connelly has been interviewed this month by Square Enix Music. Connelly first took on the series as the second mainstay composer with Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation, followed by Tomb Raider: Chronicles and the London Symphony Orchestra performed Tomb Raider: The Angel of Darkness.

Following Nathan McCree's departure from Core Design after Tomb Raider III: The Adventures of Lara Croft (1998), Connelly reiterated McCree's original 1996 Tomb Raider motif in each instalment to follow. A motif that has in fact appeared in every video game iteration of the franchise to this day, plus Alan Silvestri's score to the 2003 major motion picture, Lara Croft: Tomb Raider - The Cradle of Life. While McCree hasn't been on the video game music scene for years, Connelly was still racking up new projects, although some might consider racing games like Herdy Gerdy a step down from Lara Croft's adventures.

Chris Greening of Square Enix Music first queries Connelly about his work for Tomb Raiders 4-6:

"Working on these titles was an absolute pleasure and I respect how lucky I was to be given such an opportunity. I always give credit to Nathan McCree, the original Tomb Raider composer, as he paved the way for my own compositions on the series. Of course, I added my own twist though. Looking back, I am quite proud of what I did although, at the time, I wanted them dead and buried. Haha. As I've progressed over the years, particularly with my mixing and production skills, I often ponder over re-doing some of the work. At the top of the list would be The Last Revelation theme.

The Last Revelation theme kind of just came to me. The opening harp is what initially fell at my fingers, followed by the descending string sequence (or was it the other way round?). It wasn't until later I realised I really should add the iconic Tomb Raider melody, which worked beautifully in many places, particularly towards the end. With Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation based in Egypt, I wanted to give my compositions an essence of Egypt without being too clichéd or corny, although they probably were by the time I was done with them.

With regards to the theme music for Tomb Raider: Chronicles, I had an epic idea which, sadly, never got finished. You only hear a very small snippet of what was to be in the very first opening sequence. This has been questioned many a time and the answer to why the game didn't have a 'proper' main theme was simply... time. In retrospect, I wish I'd made more of an effort to complete it so, for my own redemption, I will re-open the original MIDI sequence someday and finish off what I started!" - Peter Connelly

Connelly further elaborates on his career at Core Design as well as the opportunity of recording Angel of Darkness at the legendary Abbey Road Studios with the London Symphony Orchestra:

"...we were thrilled... with our first choice of orchestra and studio — the London Symphony Orchestra at Abbey Road. It was a dream come true. I think we did rather well, considering it was our first live gig, as we recorded more than 40 minutes of music in less than six hours. The LSO are great to work with; they're fantastic musicians — among the world's best — and I would love to work with them again someday...

...I started at Core just as Tomb Raider III was being polished, so I had very little involvement with this project. There were a few things here and there, but that was it, so I was surprised to see my name credited with Additional Sound Effects. I did write some music for the end boss on the off chance it would get used, but it was too late to get it on the disc. I did use this music for Tomb Raider: The Last Revelations so it wasn't wasted..

...Unfortunately, I don't follow the game like I used to, but I have heard some of the soundtracks and I think they're amazing. In all honesty, I have been thinking about the possibilities of scoring another Tomb Raider soundtrack for some time now... I just need to work out the best way to approach the right people. If you can help me out...!" - Connelly

Thanks again to Chris Greening @ Square Enix Music. Full interview after the jump.