Most recent: Prescription for Sleep: Ghibli
Web: scarletmoon.com
Prescription for Sleep: Ghibli is the latest release in the Billboard-charting series featuring soothing instrumental arrangements of video game and anime soundtracks. This one includes arrangements across the Studio Ghibli catalog and was timed with the 25th anniversary of Oscar-winning film Spirited Away, scored by Joe Hisaishi. Two from the series’ creative team, GENTLE LOVE saxophonist Norihiko Hibino and Scarlet Moon Records founder Jayson Napolitano, shared details.
Music Connection: What about Hisaishi’s writing was adaptable to this series?
Jayson Napolitano: For the first album in 2014, I intentionally picked game music tracks that were already soothing in nature. As we became more confident, I started throwing curve balls at GENTLE LOVE, culminating in 2017’s Prescription for Sleep: Fight for Your Dreams, which adapted intense action and battle music into lullabies, so we’ve done it all.
MC: What’s the creative shift like, moving from the adrenaline-driven games you’ve composed to music meant to soothe listeners?
Norihiko Hibino: In terms of touching the “soul” beyond the “mind and body” through music, adrenaline-driven music and comforting music are the same.
MC: What did you want “Compassion” (an original on the album) to say that the covers couldn’t?
HN: This song is purely focused on peace and comfort. Ghibli’s movies also include a continuous theme: “love for someone.”
MC: Where is the series heading next?
JN: Hibino-san’s goal is to help and heal as many people as possible through music. So by venturing into pop music, anime, and more spaces, we’re trying to bridge the musical divide and make pop and anime fans out of game music fans and vice versa.
